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LIFE AND SERVICES 



OF 



Gen. John A. Logan 



AS 



Soldier mitt Matzsmmx 



GEORGE FRANCIS DAWSON 

Ex-Librarian of the United States Senate, etc. 



DURING THE WAR 

" I shall esteem it as the highest privilege a Just Dispenser can award, to shed the last drop of 
blood in my veins for the honor of that flag whose emblems are justice, liberty, and truth, and 
which has been and, as I humbly trust in God, ever will be, for the right." 

— Maj.-Gcn. Logan, 1862, declining to re-enter Congress. — p. 42. 

SINCE THE WAR 

"The people are honest, the people are brave, and the people are true. . . . While I live I 
will stand as their Defender. Living or dying, I shall defend the liberties of this people, making 
war against dictation and against aristocracy, and in favor of republicanism." 

— Representative Logan, 1869, on his Army Reduction Bill. — p. 214. 

" It is better to trust those who are tried than those who pretend." 

— Senator Logan, 1878, at Clinton, Ills.— p. 281. 



PUBLISHED BY SUBSCRIPTION ONLY 




Chicago and New York 
BELFORD, CLARKE & COMPANY 

1887 






Copyright, 1887 
By GEORGE FRANCIS DAWSON 



[All rights reserved] 



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NEW YORK. 



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INTRODUCTION. 

WRITTEN BY THE HAND OF MRS. JOHN A. LOGAN. 



Calumet Place, 
Washington, D. C, January 19, 1887. 

In addition to his other qualifications for such a " labor of love," 
as he has well termed it, the fact that Mr. George Francis Dawson, of 
this city, has been the friend and associate of my lamented husband 
for many years, and was selected by General Logan as his biogra- 
pher, has given him peculiar advantages, of which he has admirablv 
availed himself, in writing a just, faithful, and vivid life of General 
Logan. 

The larger part of this biography was written by Mr. Dawson over 
two years ago, from data furnished by General Logan, who afterward 
read and gave to the work, substantially in its present shape, his 
unqualified indorsement ; and more than once, before his death, ex- 
pressed the wish that Mr. Dawson's biography of him should go to 
the public with the stamp of his own authorization and approbation. 

Having read the additions which complete the history of his in- 
comparable services and spotless life, I unhesitatingly give my ap- 
proval to this publication. 

Mary S. Logan. 




TO 

THE MEMORY OF 

JOHN ALEXANDER LOGAN 

THE 

EVER-VICTORIOUS WARRIOR AND ILLUSTRIOUS STATESMAN 

THIS 

BRIEF, AND ALL TOO INADEQUATE 
RECORD 

OF 

HIS GREAT SERVICES DURING FORTY YEARS 
IN WAR, AND IN PEACE 

TO 

HIS COUNTRY AND ITS PEOPLE 



REVERENTLr DEDICATED 

BY 



THE AUTHOR 



PREFACE 



The enthusiasm kindled in the Chicago Convention of 
June, 1884, by the presentation of his name as the candidate 
of Illinois for the Presidential nomination, and the extraor- 
dinarily unanimous vote by which he was nominated for 
the Vice-Presidency, showed plainly enough the estimation 
in which General Logan was held by Republican men of 
affairs. But despite his admitted popularity and strength 
throughout the country — among the workingmen for whose 
interests he had so sturdily worked, among the Union sol- 
diers of the war whom he had so often led in battle, among 
the colored people whose champion he had been on the 
tented field, in the Congressional forum, and upon the stump 
— his life-work covered so many fields, during more than a 
quarter of a century, that much of it is unknown to the 
younger men of the present day. I have therefore thought 
that a biographical sketch of this remarkable man would 
meet a public necessity, and help to place the General in 
military and political history in that true light which his own 
modesty denied him. In preparing this work I enjoyed all 
the advantages which full access to the General's scrap- 
books, private papers, and military order-books could give 
me, in addition to the Rebellion Records and other official 
information accessible at Washington, and also freely con- 
sulted, and in some instances quoted from, the military 
works of the Comte de Paris, General Sherman's Memoirs, 
and Badeau's " Military History of Grant," besides securing 
authentic narrations of battle-scenes in which the General 
was engaged, from other active participants in the same. 
It is to these sources of information, therefore, and not to 
any qualities of my own, that I attribute whatever of dash 



x ii PREFACE. 

and merit there is in the succession of graphic and stirring 
battle-scenes, in which Logan is the hero, herewith pre- 
sented to the reader. But as to the General himself, rarely 
a word could be got descriptive of anything in which he was 
an actor. Partly with a view to establishing the authenti- 
city of certain incidents in the military part — like the story 
of the battle-born Shell-Anna, for instance — I submitted 
them to the General, and all that could be extorted from 
him was, "Well, that is true." Hence, I may conscien- 
tiously say that this work, whatever its merits or demerits 
otherwise, is authentic, and as such will be of value for ref- 
erence. Aside from this, I can also say with truth, that 
while the military part of it is, as it were, a panorama of 
the great War of the Rebellion — or of that large part of it 
in the West, Southwest, and South in which General Logan 
prominently figured — so the political part of it, before, dur- 
ing, and since the war, is a panorama of the Nation's politi- 
cal life during the past quarter-century. General Logan 
was so active on the stump and in the halls of National 
legislation, and his tongue so eloquent and impressive, that 
the extracts given herein from some of his many great 
speeches are a succession of word-pictures luminously sug- 
gestive of all that has occurred during that period involving 
the National existence and growth. They cannot fail to be 
instructive, entertaining, and delightful to the reader, as they 
have been fascinating to myself. Whatever of labor was 
involved in this work has been a labor of love — of love for 
the man, for the soldier, for the statesman, for that great 
Party of Progress of which he was so eminent a leader, and 
especially of love for those grand Anglo-Saxon principles of 
freedom of speech and person, liberty of action, and self-gov- 
ernment upon which our great Republic, through the wis- 
dom of that party and the heroism of our Union soldiers, 
now securely rests. In offering it to the public, my only 
regret is that it falls far short of doing full justice to the 
invincible soldier and illustrious citizen of whom it treats. 

Geo. Frs. Dawson. 
Washington, D. C, January 19, 1887. 



CONTENTS. 



PART I.— LOGAN BEFORE THE WAR. 



Prelude i 

Logan's parentage, birth, boyhood, early 
surroundings, and education 2 

Marked characteristics of his parents — His 
father's wonderful courage 3 

Logan's youth — Those slow-coach days — 
The squirrel's story 4 

A born leader — A daring feat — Story of 
the flat-boat — Goes to college — War 
with Mexico — He volunteers 6 

Return from Mexico — His first public of- 
fice — Reads law — Graduates from Louis- 
ville University — Practising law — In the 
State Legislature 8 

Elected District Attorney — His uniform 



success — Incident of his skill in defence 
— His marriage — Again in Legislat- 
ure 9 

In Congress — At the Charleston Conven- 
tion — The slave-pens of the South — His 
efforts to avert war 10 

Lovejoy threatened with violence in the 
House — Free-speech in peril — Logan 
cows the fire-eaters and secures Love- 
joy a hearing 12 

The baseless charge that Logan was a 
"Secession sympathizer" — The war 
breaks out — Logan leaves the House, 
shoulders a musket, and fights at Bull 
Run 13 



PART II.— LOGAN IN THE WAR. 



General McCook describes Logan at Bull 
Run — Logan's return to Washington 
and ' ' Egypt " — The sacrifices he made — 
Magical effect of his words on a mob — 
He turns secessionists into Union sol- 
diers-Southern Illinois saved to the 
Union IS 

Battle of Belmont -Characteristic inci- 
dent—Colonel Logan's bravery and 
"admirable tactics" — His horse shot 
under him 19 

Logan at Fort Henry — He is the first to 
enter it — His intrepidity and skill at 
Fort Donelson — Carried wounded from 
the field, having earned a Brigadier- 
Generalship — General Grant's recom- 
mendation 21 

General Logan in command of a brigade 
— His services at Corinth— Sherman's 
appreciation of them 25 

Logan solicited to return to Congress — 



His grandly patriotic refusal: "I have 
entered the field to die, if need be, for 
this Government " — His only politics, 
" attachment for the Union " 26 

Northern Mississippi Campaign — Logan 
leads the advance — Is made Major-Gen- 
eral — At Memphis — Assigned to com- 
mand of Third Division, Seventeenth 
Corps — Stirring address to his fellow- 
soldiers 28 

From Memphis to Lake Providence— 
Canalling— A bold proposal— Logan's 
men " man " the transports that run the 
terrible fire of Vicksburg's guns 31 

Logan at the victory of Port Gibson — His 
men determine the battle of the Big 
Black — Logan flanks the enemy and 
drives him again — Consequent evacua- 
tion of Grand Gulf—' ' The road to Vicks- 
burg now open " 3 2 

Battle of Raymond—" One of the hardest 



XIV 



CONTENTS. 



small battles of the war " — Logan's di- 
vision wins it — The battle of Jackson . . 34 

Logan outflanks the enemy at the battle of 
Champion Hills and secures victory to 
the Union arms — Retreat and rout of 
the enemy — " The most complete de- 
feat of the Confederates since the com- 
mencement of the war " 35 

Siege of Vicksburg — "The Gibraltar of 
the South " — Logan at the centre — 
Bombardment by land and water — The 
two desperately bloody assaults 40 

The siege-works — Logan blows up the 
" Malakoff " of Vicksburg — The fight in 
the crater — Logan's close approaches — 
He advises a final assault — Armistice 
and surrender— Logan leads the trium- 
phal entry — Made military governor of 
Vicksburg and receives a medal 44 

A military interlude — Logan takes the 
stump for the Lincoln administration — 
Attacks the enemy in the rear — Elo- 
quent appeals to patriotism to stand by 
" the cause " — The good they did 46 

Logan in command of the Fifteenth Corps 
— He orders its corps-badge to be a 
cartridge-box and "forty rounds" — 
The advance on Atlanta — The stubborn 
battle of Resaca — Logan's victorious 
attack on the enemy's flank — His untir- 
ing vigilance 49 

Battle of Dallas — Logan's corps brilliantly 
repulse repeated charges of Hardee's 
veteran corps — Logan's gallant bearing 
at a critical moment — He is again 
wounded 53 

Battle of Big Kenesavv Mountain — The 
desperate assault upon the impregnable 
face of Little Kenesaw Mountain — Won- 
derful discipline of our soldiers — Un- 
paralleled heroism of Logan and his 
men — Through Marietta and Decatur 
to Atlanta 55 

The great battle of Atlanta — Death of the 
brave McPherson — The heroic Logan 
succeeds him — Taking command of a 
flanked army, with its idolized com- 
mander killed and panic impending, 
fighting in front and rear, Logan con- 
verts threatened disaster into a glorious 
victory — The bloodiest battle of the 
West — Logan's personal prowess — One 
of the finest battle-pictures of the war. . 58 

Another flank movement of the Army of 



PAGK 

the Tennessee in a pitch-dark night — 
Logan all night in the saddle — His re- 
markable military skill 70 

Howard's appointment to the command — 
Without a murmur Logan returns to his 
brave Fifteenth Corps — The desperate 
battle of Ezra Chapel — Logan's corps 
defeats the enemy's army — Six gallant 
charges repelled — The rebel army com- 
pletely repulsed by Logan 71 

Logan's corps still pressing the enemy — 
On the right again — Destruction of West 
Point Railroad — On to Jonesboro' 75 

Touching incident of the Atlanta cam- 
paign — The fatherless battle-born babe 
" Shell -Anna " — The christening — 
Logan the godfather 76 

Battle of Jonesboro' — Logan whips Lee's 
and Hardee's corps again — Consequent 
evacuation of Atlanta — Logan's patri- 
otic address to his gallant corps 80 

Another interlude — Logan on the stump 
again, defending the party of the Union . 86 

Logan's rare magnanimity — He gives 
"Pap" Thomas his chance, at Nash- 
ville — Logan rejoins the Fifteenth Corps 
at Savannah 87 

The campaign of the Carolinas — Its rela- 
tive importance greater than " the 
march to the sea" — The part Logan's 
corps contributed to it 88 

Terrible sufferings and difficulties of the 
march — Advancing and fighting with 
water up to the middle — Logan working 
with his men night and day in the 
swamps — Various skirmishes and en- 
gagements 89 

Forcing the passage of the Little Sal- 
kahatchie and Congaree — Charging 
through mud and water — The surrender 
of Columbia — The city in flames — Lo- 
gan's men stay the fire 91 

Passage of Lynch's Creek Bottom and 
Black Creek — Logan's men " up to their 
armpits in water " drive the enemy — 
The terrible quicksands and swamps 
between Lumber River and Little Rock 
Fish Creek 92 

Crossing the Cape Clear and South Rivers 
—The Battle of Bentonville or Mill 
Creek — Logan's successive gallant 
charges upon the enemy, driving him 
into his works — The enemy evacuates 
and retreats 93 



CONTENTS. 



xv 



Striking incidents of Logan's humanity 
and justice 94 

Fall of Richmond and Petersburg — Lo- 
gan's advance on Smithfield — Johnston 
evacuates it — The advance on Raleigh 
— Johnston surrenders and the war ends 
— Logan organizes the Society of the 
Army of the Tennessee 95 

Assassination of Lincoln — Thrilling in- 
stance of Logan's personal heroism — He 
saves the people of Raleigh from mur- 
der, arson, and " worse than death "... 96 



Logan again in command of the Army 
of the Tennessee — On the march to 
Washington — The grand review — He 
musters out his 60,000 veterans 
and resigns — His affecting farewell 
address to the Army of the Tennes- 
see 97 

Resume of Logan's remarkable military 
career — A tribute to the American vol- 
unteer soldier — Logan the highest em- 
bodiment of the soldier who never for- 
got he was a citizen 100 



PART III.— LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 



Logan's personal appearance and some of 
his characteristics 104 

Logan the statesman — The Cooper Union 
meeting at New York — He frustrates 
the attempted capture of our Union 
generals by the Democratic leaders . . . 105 

He suggests the pressing of the Alabama 
claims, retirement of Maximilian, and 
honest payment of our national debt. . . 107 

His great speech at Louisville, Ky. — On 
slavery, emancipation, and education — 
The war and its results — He beards the 
lion in his den 107 

The political campaign of 1865 — Logan's 
campaign services — Appointed minister 
to Mexico, but declines 112 

He declines appointment as minister to 
Japan — Nominated to Congress from 
the State at Large — His extraordinary 
canvass of Illinois in 1866 — Malignant 
vilification 114 

His magnetic influence — Denunciation of 
Andrew Johnson's contemplated treason 
— Logan carries his State by 60,000 ma- 
jority 115 

Congressman Logan after the war — His 
great speech on reconstruction — De- 
fence of the Republican policy — He rid- 
dles Andrew Johnson's policy — Peni- 
tence before forgiveness— A " renewed 
loyalty " the key-note of proper recon- 
struction 116 

The reason why Democratic leaders hated 
Logan — How Logan saved to the Gov- 
ernment nearly one million dollars 121 

Logan elected commander-in-chief of the 
Grand Army of the Republic — Objects 



of that order — He institutes Memorial 
or Decoration Day 123 

Passages from one of his Memorial Day 
orations — A thrilling war-picture 125 

Impeachment of Andrew Johnson — Logan 
one of the House-managers — His great 
effort before the High Court of Im- 
peachment — What Sumner and others 
said of it 128 

Pensions for the War of 1812 — Logan 
advocates the bill, and explains 
the ground upon which pensions are 
granted 133 

Logan declines to run for Governor of 
Illinois — "The centre of attraction" in 
the House — Again nominated Repre- 
sentative at Large — At the Chicago 
Convention, 1868, he nominates Grant 
for President 134 

Logan's key-note speech in the House, 
1868 — Scathing review of the "Prin- 
ciples of the Democratic Party" — Good 
reading for young men, even now 136 

Logan in the campaign of 1868 — What 
was said of his efforts — His great 
speeches at Poughkeepsie, N. Y. , and 
Morris, 111 153 

He is re-elected to Congress — The 
Jenckes "Tenure of office " or "Civil 
Service " bill— Logan attacks it and 
shows its dangers 159 

His early stand against money-subsidies 
to railroads — The Eastern Division Pa- 
cific Railroad Bill — Logan calls a halt, 
and defeats the bill 161 

The electoral count of 1869 — Turbulent 
scenes in joint convention — Ben. But- 



XVI 



CONTEXTS. 



PAGE 

ler's attempt to bully Congress— Logan 
squelches him 165 

Removal of the capital to the Mississippi 
Valley — A great speech — Logan's 
powerful appeal for the readmission of 
Virginia 166 

He secures the branding of Whittemore 
by the House, for corruption — His ap- 
peal to the courage of the House 168 

Logan's plea for struggling Cuba — He 
asks for belligerent rights 169 

Logan's Army Reduction Bill— It effects 
a saving of millions annually — Its pas- 
sage " the greatest triumph of that 
Congress " 17 2 

His reply to General Sherman's letter op- 
posing army reduction and reform — Lo- 
gan demolishes it— Eloquent protest 
against military dictation, and defence 
of the liberties of the people 173 

Logan the author of the Fifteenth Amend- 
ment, as agreed to 176 

His eulogy on General Thomas— A fitting 
and eloquent tribute to the " Rock of 
Chickamauga " 178 

Logan elected a third time commander- 
in-chief of the Grand Army— His last 
general orders touching Decoration Day 
—Grand Army resolutions — A hand- 
some tribute to " the soldier's friend ". 181 

How General Logan was at this time re- 
garded in " Egypt " 183 

Another big debate on Cuba — Logan's 
prominent part in it — He handles Ben. 
Butler without gloves 184 

Whittemore again attempts to get his seat 
— The House, under Logan's lead, ex- 
cludes him, and returns his credentials. 186 

Logan renominated by acclamation in 1870 
— His great services on the stump in 
Illinois, Indiana, and Iowa — Sensation 
in Iowa wherever he appears — The 
Senatorship 188 

Pen-portrait of General Logan— Analysis 
of his methods and manner in speech- 
making 19 1 

Logan at Springfield — The records of 
the two parties contrasted — A passage 
of remarkable eloquence 194 

Logan puts through the House a bill to 
abolish the offices of Admiral and Vice- 
Admiral of the navy — He is elected to 
the U. S. Senate 196 

The great Chicago fire — Senator Logan's 



PAGB 

efforts for congressional relief — His 
vivid description of the catastrophe 198 

Sumner's bitter attack on Grant — Logan's 
withering rejoinder — A noble defence of 
his old commander 200 

Logan's stirring speech at El Paso — The 
differences between Democracy and 
Republicanism 203 

Senator Logan secures the prohibition of 
the sale of arms to Indians, and defeats 
injurious legislation 206 

General Logan's oration before the Army 
of the Tennessee at Toledo, O., 1873 .. 208 

Logan on the stump in Indiana, 1874 — His 
" rousing " speech at Indianapolis 209 

His remarkable oration at Clinton, 111. — 
Personal liberty traced to the fountain- 
head — Our own Government a compro- 
mise between such liberty and cen- 
tralism 211 

A legal incident in Logan's career — 
Among the silver-mines of Colorado. . . 217 

Logan talked of for President in 1876.... 218 

What the old soldiers thought of Logan's 
efforts in their behalf in Congress 218 

Logan's tilt with Confederate brigadiers 
in 1876 — His defence of Sheridan and 
Grant — The White League " banditti " 
— Democratic sympathizers in the Sen- 
ate roughly handled — The old ship 219 

Proposed transfer of the Indian Bureau 
to the War Department — Senator Logan 
eloquently opposes it, and pleads for 
Indian civilization and good faith 223 

Logan's views on finance — Non-tax- 
ability of bonds and notes — Necessity 
for upholding the national credit 227 

The footprints of parties on the avenues 

of time— Words of living light 229 

The difference between real and represen- 
tative money and " fiat " money— A per- 
tinent story 232 

A coincidence — General Logan again 
elected to the U. S. Senate— Great re- 
joicings over it everywhere — A poem — 
His welcome to Carbondale— Grand 
welcome back to Washington — His 
great speech at the capital— His first act 
on returning to the Senate in behalf of 
the old soldiers 235 

His great speech in 1879, on the Army Ap- 
propriation Bill— His brave words and 
solemn warning to the revolutionists. . . 243 

One of the "Confederate brigadiers ' 



CONTENTS. 



xv a 



PAGE 

challenges him — General Logan treats 
his communications with contempt and 
tells his second to "go to hell " 253 

Logan's domestic life at Washington — 
His wife and children 260 

General Schenck attacked in the Senate 
— Logan promptly defends the old pa- 
triot 261 

Logan's speech on the U. S. Marshals 
Appropriation Bill — The Democratic 
attempt at " Nullification and Anarchy " 263 

On the stump again — The great demand 
for Logan — Characteristic incidents 
touching the old soldiers 268 

Logan's canvass of Ohio in 1879 — At Day- 
ton, Springfield, Van Wert, Bellefon- 
taine, and elsewhere — Ovations every- 
where 270 

His campaign in Iowa — Ovation after 
ovation along the whole line from Wat- 
erloo to Burlington — Logan excels in 
a new role 273 

His speech in 1879, on the reciprocal 
duties of the citizen to the Government 
and the Government to the citizen 277 

Logan secures the Republican National 
Convention of 1880 for Chicago by a 
flank movement 278 

His able legal argument in the Senate on 
the five-per-cent. claims of Illinois and 
other States 279 

The Fitz John Porter case, 1880 — Logan's 
wonderful four-days' speech before a lis- 
tening Senate and crowded galleries. . . 280 



Death of Zach. Chandler — Logan's im- 
pressive account of his dead friend's 
last hours— Eulogy in the Senate 282 

The Logan "boom" in 1880— Garfield 
moved to tears by his early and hearty 
support— Logan's wonderful personal 
campaign in 1880 — He strives to make 
peace between Conkling and Gar- 
field 285 

Logan's loyalty before the war — His tri- 
umphant speech of vindication in 1881 
— Democratic and Republican Senators 
follow it with their personal testimony . 288 

Grant's defence of Fitz John Porter — Lo- 
gan shows it to be founded on a misap- 
prehension of the real facts 292 

Logan's speech on the bill to retire Gen- 
eral Grant — He " rattles " the Confed- 
erate brigadiers again — A fine tribute 
to Grant's military genius 294 

His speech in the Senate on arrearages of 
pensions — His defence of the wounded 
soldiers 296 

Logan's bill devoting internal revenue re- 
ceipts to education — A great, statesman- 
ly, instructive speech 298 

Fitz John Porter bill of 1884 — Logan again 
assails the obnoxious bill — He bids the 
Confederate brigadiers beware ! 305 

Senator Logan assailed as a" land-grab- 
ber" — He proves the charge to be 
"maliciously false" — Even the Demo- 
cratic Senators laugh the charge to 
scorn 307 



PART IV.— LOGAN ON THE PRESIDENTIAL TICKET. 



Genera! Logan again talked of for the 
Presidency — A train of Logan men 
reaches Chicago — Illinois decides to 
present his name to the Chicago Con- 
vention of 1884 309 

His name presented as the candidate of 
Illinois— The enthusiasm with which it 
was received 311 

The four ballots — How Logan secured 
the nomination of Blaine, and why he 
did it — His famous despatch 313 

How Logan was nominated for the Vice- 
Presidency — On roll-call he gets 779 
votes — The nomination by acclama- 
tion 317 



How the news of Logan's nomination was 
received in Washington — an impromptu 
ovation — Logan's congratulations to 
Blaine — Blaine's reply — Blaine's ova- 
tion in Augusta — His happy reference 
to Logan 319 

How the press and people throughout the 
country hailed the nomination of Logan 322 

Republicans at Washington preparing 
to ratify — The Illinois Republican Asso- 
ciation call and pay their respects 328 

Logan in Maine — An ovation from Port- 
land to Augusta — Grand reception in 
Augusta — His stirring speech at Mr. 
Blaine's residence 329 



.Will 



CONTENTS. 



Blaine's speech at Bangor when present- 
ing General Logan to its citizens — Lo- 
gan's handsome tribute to James G. 
Blaine 33 1 

Resolutions of the State Republican As- 
sociations at the national capital — Lo- 
gan's strength in Indiana, etc 333 

Great ratification meeting at the national 
capital — Addresses of Sherman, Hawley, 
Frye, Harrison, Raum, Reed, Phelps, 
Fred. Douglass, Dingley, Miller, Milli- 
ken, Horr, Smalls, Pettibone, Goff, and 
others of note — Good things said of both 
Blaine and Logan 335 

Grand serenade by the ex-soldiers and 
sailors to Logan at Washington — Ad- 
dress by General Green B. Raum — Lo- 
gan's reply — Speeches of Senator 
Plumb and others — " Brains and pluck, 
or pluck and brains " 342 



The Republican National Convention 
Committee call upon and officially noti- 
fy Logan of his nomination — General 
Henderson's address — General Logan's 
response 347 

The letter of acceptance — Protection — 
Our financial system — Interstate and 
foreign commerce — Foreign relations — 
Equal rights — Immigration — Civil Ser- 
vice, etc 349 

General Logan's journey to Minneapolis 
— An enthusiastic ovation all the way 
from Pittsburg — Grand reception at 
Minneapolis — Meeting of the Grand Ar- 
my — The greatest demonstration of the 
Northwest 359 

Logan's reception elsewhere — His more 
than royal progress through the States 
— His exhausting campaign labors — Re- 
sult of the election — How Logan bore it. 361 



PART V.— LOGAN SINCE 1884. 



Logan's memorably gallant fight for the 
Illinois senatorship — Hopeless odds 
against him — He wins his third senato- 
rial term — His address to the Legisla- 
ture 363 

Public interest in Logan's victory — Tele- 
grams of congratulation, etc 366 

Enthusiastic ovations from Springfield to 
Chicago — Logan's reception at Chicago. 368 

Banquet to Logan by the Chicago Union 
League Club— His modest speech 370 

Logan's Presidential "boom" for 1888, 
starting strongly 371 

His return to Washington — Salute of 100 
guns in honor of his election 372 

Logan visits Grant's sick-chamber — Old 
war-memories revived 373 

Enthusiastic reception of Logan at the 
G. A. R. Encampment, Portland, Me.— 
His telling speeches there 374 

The Logan banquet in Boston — A charac- 
teristic incident — His vigorous speech 
on " Civil Service reform " and " offen- 
sive partisanship" — "Fair play" de- 
manded 378 

Fourth of July oration by Logan at Wood- 
stock, Conn. ,1885 381 

Logan on Grant — Address to the G. A. R. 



in the M. E. Memorial Church, Wash- 
ington — Eloquent review of that great 
chieftain's services 385 

Banqueted by the " Logan Invincibles " at 
Baltimore — Logan's ' ' bloody-saddle " 
speech — Elkins gives Grant's high es- 
timate of Logan 398 

Logan declines the Presidency of the 
United States Senate— His popularity 
still extending 402 

New Year's (1886) reception by Logan at 
his Washington residence — A descrip- 
tive poem 4°3 

Logan dined by the Philadelphia " Clover 

Club" 406 

L He again attacks the (modified) Fitz John 
Porter bill in the Senate 4°7 

Speech on admission of Dakota — Logan 
riddles the Democratic opposition— He 
unhorses Senator Butler 408 

Logan's idea of "decorations" — He de- 
clares against secret sessions of the 
Senate 4°9 

The great " Republican Club" banquet 
in Detroit — Logan's enthusiastic recep- 
tion and stirring speech 4 10 

His eloquent advice to the American ne- 
gro — The possibilities of that race 412 



CONTENTS. 



xix 



Logan's grand Memorial Day oration at 
the tomb of Grant, Riverside Park, New 
York. 1886 413 

The Payne senatorial election case— Hal- 
stead's attack on Logan — His crushing 
rejoinder 427 

Logan goes to the G. A. R. Encampment 
at San Francisco — He is bombarded 
with flowers — Is enthusiastically re- 
ceived everywhere on the Pacific coast 
— His speech to the Mormons 430 

His return — Public receptions at St. Paul, 
Minneapolis, and Chicago 436 



I'AGE 

His speech at the Soldiers' Reunion, Cairo, 
September 30, 1886— The true theory 
of pensions — Eloquent passages 438 

Logan's last great out door public ad- 
dress, at Marion, October 4, 1886 

" The issues of the day ''—The Demo- 
cratic Party a failure— The Republican 
'Party vindicated 44I 

His last camp-fire speech, at Youngstown, 
O. , November 18, 1886 443 

Logan's magazine work — Book-making — 
" The Great Conspiracy " 444 

His Presidential star waxing rapidly 445 



PART VI.— LOGAN'S LAST DAYS AND DEATH. 



Logan's return to Washington — His last 
drive — Attacked by rheumatism — His 
last appearance in the Senate — A siege 
of agony 447 

His graphic stories — His estimate of Lin- 
coln as a joker — Logan's gallop along 
the lines at Vicksburg — His unrecorded 
wound 449 

His anecdotes about Hazen and others — 
Logan's ideas about military discipline 
— How Mrs. Logan " cut a man down." 454 

Logan talks of Douglas and the war- 
About General Sherman 455 

Getting worse — Bad nights — Reading 
Logan to sleep — His opinion of the 
memoirs of Lee 457 

The passing away — Affecting scenes in 
the chamber of death 460 

Calumet Place in mourning — The guard- 



mount — The question of final resting- 
P'ace 461 

The Senate Committee of Arrangements 
and the pall-bearers— Taking the re- 
mains from Calumet Place — Logan ly- 
ing in state under the great white dome 463 

Letters of condolence from notable per- 
sons everywhere 465 

The wonderful profusion of floral offer- 
ings — A mound of flowers 467 

The obsequies in the Senate Chamber — 
The Rev. Dr. Newman's eloquent fu- 
neral panegyric on Logan 468 

The funeral procession to Rock Creek 
church-yard — Services at the tomb — 
Sounding " taps " (lights out) 475 

Poem on the " Death of Logan " 478 

How the press and people of the land 
mourned the sad loss of Logan 482 



PART VII.— ADDENDA. 



493 



Logan's influence upon our statute-book 
— The impress of his thought on all 
important national legislation enacted 
since the war 

Secret of Logan's popularity with the 
farmer, the laborer, the soldier, the col- 
ored man , and the Irish voter 495 

The charge that Logan "murdered the 
king's English" disposed of — His 
speeches " beds of pearls " — A random 
string of them 499 

Logan's literary tastes and treasures — Ex- 



tent of his classical and other knowl- 
edge — How he prepared his speeches. . 505 
Why Sherman displaced him from com- 
mand of the Army of the Tennessee af- 
ter Logan's great victory of Atlanta — 
The Sherman-Logan correspondence — 
Sherman's oral and written statements 
since Logan's death — Hitherto unpub- 
lished letters of Sherman to Halleck 
and to Logan himself— Hooker's letter 
to Logan — The real reasons for Sher- 
man's injustice 505 



XX 



CONTENTS. 



Logan "thrice " refuses "the crown," in 
1880 — His wonderful fortitude under a 
reverse — Frye's denial — Several bits of 
unwritten history 525 

Logan's last Christmas-Eve souvenir — A 
poem 5 2 8 

Logan's brave Scottish ancestry — Mean- 
ing of the name — Robert the Bruce's 
vow — Sir James Douglas and the 
Bruce's heart - Heroic charge against 
the Saracens in Spain — Valor of Sir 



Robert and Sir Walter Logan — The 
Logan estates forfeited, and the name 
proscribed — The Logan armorial bear- 
ings 531 

Logan's swarthy complexion — How he 
probably came by it 534 

Mrs. .General Logan — Her personal ap- 
pearance and ancestry — The stirring 
events of her varied life — A brave, kind, 
devoted, self-sacrificing, tactful, woman- 
ly woman 536 



APPENDIX 



Part I. — Logan eulogies in the U. S. 
Senate — Tributes of Senators Cul- 
lom, Morgan, Edmunds, Manderson, 
Hampton, Allison, Hawley, Spooner, 
Cockrell, Frye, Plumb, Evarts, Sabin, 
Palmer, and Farwell 545 

Part II. — Logan eulogies in House of Rep- 
resentatives — Tributes of Representa- 
tives Thomas, T. J. Henderson, McKin- 



ley, Randall, Cannon, Butterworth, 
D. B. Henderson, Holman, Springer, 
George E. Adams, Rogers, Rowell, 
Daniel, McComas, A. J. Weaver, 
Cutcheon, Wilson, Rice, Caswell, 
O'Hara, Goff, Osborne, Payson, Brady, 
Hitt, Symes, Lawler, Perkins, Petti- 
bone, Haynes, Buchanan, J. H. Ward, 
Gallinger, Plumb, Jackson, and C. M. 
Anderson 556 



LIFE OF GENERAL JOHN A. LOGAN. 



PART I. 



LOGAN BEFORE THE WAR. 

PRELUDE. 

It has been well said that the life of General John A. 
Logan was one of such ceaseless activity, rapid changes, ear- 
nest endeavor, and impressive situations, that it is extremely 
difficult to do justice to the man, his motives, his character, 
to the masterly labors he performed, to the exalted posi- 
tion he won, and the lasting benefits he conferred upon his 
country in forensic arenas, in legislative halls, and the 
broader and more stirring fields of battle. For most men 
of genius it is enough to shine in one walk or profession of 
life ; but General Logan's light was prismatic, as the inci- 
dents of his life were kaleidoscopic. He attained eminence 
in many fields. As a Congressional Representative and 
Senator his record was brilliant, consistent, and statesmanly ; 
as a jurist his eminence was attested by his long service on 
the Judiciary Committee of the highest representative body 
in the land ; as a soldier he strode rapidly up from the ranks 
of a private to the command of an army ; as an orator he was 
second to none in the Republic ; as a candidate for Vice- 
Presidential honors on the Republican ticket he was acknowl- 



2 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

edged to be as strong and generally popular as the great 
leader who headed it ; and his rapidly increasing popularity 
everywhere, since then, plainly pointed to his nomination 
and election, in 1888, to the Presidency of the Nation, until 
death cut off the prospect. 

logan's parentage, birth, boyhood, early surroundings, 



AND EDUCATION. 



Early in this century, Dr. John Logan, the father of Gen- 
eral Logan, came with his father from the North of Ireland 
to cast his fortunes with those of our young Republic. He 
was a physician. At first he settled in Maryland, and after- 
ward in Missouri, where he married a French lady,— one of 
the rich colonists of that early day, — by whom he had one 
daughter, still living. Having lost his first wife, Dr. Logan 
removed to Illinois, settling at what was then called 
" Brownsville," the county-seat of Jackson County. Here it 
was that he first met Miss Elizabeth Jenkins, a native of 
North Carolina, and sister of Lieutenant-Governor A. M. 
Jenkins of Illinois, and was soon thereafter united to her in 



marriage. 

o 



Upon his second marriage Dr. Logan took up his resi- 
dence near Brownsville, on a large farm, on which the thriv- 
ing town of Murphysborough now stands. Here, in the 

comfortable and capacious weather-boarded log farm-house 

whose ruins were still standing four years ago in the out- 
skirts of that town, but have since been destroyed by an 
accidental fire, — were born to him eleven children, of whom 
John Alexander Logan, the subject of this sketch, who first 
saw light on February 9, 1826, was the eldest. 

The primitive condition of the country at that day was 
such as to make great exactions upon the time of any phy- 
sician, but doubly so in the case of one so skilful and suc- 
cessful as Dr. Logan. Hence it was only at intervals that 
he could spare the time from his practice and professional 



LOGAN BEFORE THE WAR. , 

studies to engage in the duties incident to farm-life. Him- 
self a studious man, he was anxious to afford his children bet- 
ter educational facilities than were then in that neighborhood. 
He therefore employed a tutor, who resided with the family 
and undertook to train young John, his brothers and sisters, 
in branches not then taught in the schools thereabout — such 
as the rudiments of Greek and Latin ; and it was no doubt 
the acquaintance thus formed with the latter tongue that 
enabled young Logan at a later period, while in Mexico, to 
acquire the fluency in the use of the Spanish language which 
he possessed to the end. 

MARKED CHARACTERISTICS OF LOGAN'S PARENTS— AN INCIDENT 
OF HIS FATHER'S WONDERFUL COURAGE. 

Those who knew Dr. Logan well, describe him not alone 
as being a physician and surgeon of remarkable skill, but a 
man of marked characteristics. Although himself of eood 
family, he not only believed in but practised social democracy. 
He recognized no ranks in society — no such thing as aristoc- 
racy. He has been known to keep such local magnates as 
the Judge of the Circuit Court and chief officers of the Illi- 
nois Central Railroad waiting while attending the wants of 
some laboring man. It was his creed that all men who are 
honest and upright are equal, and deserve equal respect. 
He was absolutely sincere in this, as in all things — for he 
hated cant. He was a man of the strictest integrity, gener- 
ous and kind to everybody, and devoted to his friends. He 
was never known to swear an oath nor indulge in dissipa- 
tions of any sort. He took much pride and pleasure in his 
fine stock of horses and hounds, and, in the days when foxes 
were plentiful, was fond of the chase. His hospitality was 
unstinted, and it was at his house that the Wesleyan Method- 
ist ministers preached whenever, in travelling their circuit, 
they came near him. They recognized in him not only 
" A foine owld Irish gintleman, one of the rale owld kind," 



4 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

but an honest, upright, sincerely Christian gentleman. He 
was, moreover, possessed of a dauntless courage. As a 
curious instance of that and of his surgical skill, it may be 
mentioned that while on his death-bed in 1851, suffering 
from an abscess on the liver — from which he died — he strove 
hard to persuade his family to rig up a mirror and allow him 
to perform an operation on himself ! The family, however, 
would not consent. 

His second wife — " Mother Logan," as she is still affec- 
tionately termed in the General's family — came of Scottish 
ancestry and had strong Scotch characteristics. She was 
tall, slender, and her deportment erect and stately to the 
period of her death in 1877. She was very quiet in her 
manner, very calm and self-possessed, and very strong in 
her prejudices. Her intuitive conception of the character of 
others was wonderful. More than once occasion arose to 
demonstrate her determined courage ; and no woman ever 
lived more remarkable for consistency — for, when once a line 
was marked out, with her there was no such thing as turning 
to right or left. She was an admirable helpmate for such a 
man as her husband, and was always greatly devoted to her 
family. She lived long enough to take pride in the Sena- 
torial as well as Military honors won by her gifted son. 

LOGAN IN HIS YOUTH AN INCIDENT OF THOSE SLOW-COACH 

DAYS LOGAN AND THE SQUIRRELS. 

Young John grew up from childhood to youth much as 
would other children with similar surroundings and oppor- 
tunities. Those were slow-coach days. One incident of his 
boyhood will suffice to illustrate this. It was a half-day's 
trip from the farm to the grist-mill. One day he started off 
with grain to the mill, accompanied by one of the colored 
boys employed by his father. He reached the mill in a ter- 
rible rain-storm, and all took shelter under the open shed 



LOGAN BEFORE THE WAR. 

which covered the machinery. This mill, like the Mexican 
arastra, was worked by a horse harnessed to a horizontal 
shaft or pole, which was dragged round and round, as a cap- 
stan-bar is pushed, and revolved the millstones by means of 
hide-belting. The rain beat in furiously, and the beltino- 
stretched to such an extent that it became useless, became 
disconnected with the shafting, and fell down. The boys, 
despairing of more comfortable quarters for the night, made 
the best of it and went to sleep, a number of the hounds 
which had accompanied them, at their feet. When morning 
broke and the miller arrived, it was discovered that the half- 
famished dogs had scented out the rain-soaked hide-belting 
and devoured it ! The miller was in despair. He had no 
more belting, nor could he get any. Nothing remained for 
him but to make it himself; and young Logan and his col- 
ored companion were obliged to wait there for a couple of 
days while the miller killed and skinned an ox and dried its 
hide for a new belting ! This was one of those events in 
young John's life which he took philosophically — because 
there was nothing else that could be done. 

When he was about ten years old, it happened one day 
that the farm-hands being all busy at other work, his father, 
having observed that the squirrels were attacking one of his 
corn-fields, sent young John to drive them off. A road ran 
by the field, and on an adjacent tree it was customary to pin 
with wooden tacks certain public notices so that passers-by 
might read and act accordingly. The boy had observed this. 
Whether it was that he had "other fish to fry "just then, 
or whether it was that love of fair play which always pos- 
sessed him, the reader himself can judge ; but certain it is 
that a neighbor riding by at a later hour, seeing a notice 
pinned to the tree, rode up to it, and to his astonishment read 
this notice in a large, boyish hand : 

I give notice to all the squirrels to keep out of this cornfield. If 
they don't keep out they will be shot. John A. Logan. 



6 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

And sure enough next morning he was on hand with a lot of 
other boys and some of the farm-hands, armed with shot- 
guns to exterminate them. 

Fifty-one years have since passed away, and to-day that 
corn-field is covered with the houses of Murphysborough. 

That "the child is father of the man" was never more 
evident than in comparing this notice with one which he sent 
to some persons in Southern Illinois, who wrote to him both 
coaxing and threatening letters before the war, urging him 
to join the Knights of the Golden Circle. It ran thus : 

If you fellows don't keep out of the Knights of the Golden Circle, 
some of you will be strung up. John A. Logan. 

LOGAN A BORN LEADER A DARING FEAT STORY OF THE 

FLAT-BOAT HE GOES TO COLLEGE THE WAR WITH MEXICO 

HE JOINS THE ARMY OF INVASION. 

From his earliest boyhood young Logan was always a 
leader — whether at the common-school, which for a time he 
attended, or at play with other youths, or in the various ex- 
peditions in which childhood loves to engage. His geniality 
and capacity for anecdote made him much sought after, even 
as a youth. He always liked company, and always had at- 
tentive auditors, whether playing the violin or indulging in 
narration to a crowd of listeners. But whenever study or 
other duties required attention he went at them with the 
same rapid earnestness which always distinguished whatever 
he undertook. It was the same with everything — work first, 
play afterward ; and, while he loved play and companionship 
as much as any youth, he always conscientiously performed 
the less palatable task first. 

When he was but fifteen or sixteen years of age young 
John took it into his head to build a flat-boat for the Muddy 
River, which ran near the paternal farm. The boat was duly 
constructed and launched. But the Muddy was at that time 



LOGAN BEFORE THE WAR. y 

a rapid and dangerous stream, and when it came to a question 
of who could pilot it out, all were afraid to venture the haz- 
ardous feat. But as in all his subsequent life Logan never 
hesitated to accept responsibilities, so now the fearless boy- 
jumped aboard and steered her out in safety.* 

It was shortly after this characteristic incident that, at the 
age of sixteen, the youth entered Shiloh College, where he 
remained some three years. 

Thus passed the years of John A. Logan's life, from 
childhood to youth and to young manhood, alternating the 
duties of Western farm-life with its innocent amusements and 
sociality, and with such intervals of more or less serious 
study as could be spared from more pressing calls — at times, 
no doubt, his mind perturbed by vague questionings whether 
he were not intended for more stirring work in life than that, 
and doubtless wishing for a change. 

The change was near at hand. 

It was the year 1846. The relations between the United 
States and Mexico were growing strained. Then came the 
declaration of war, which stirred the martial blood in his 
veins. At the call for troops, fired with patriotic zeal, young 
Logan, then but twenty years of age, abandoned farm and 
studies and entered the American army as a lieutenant of 
Company H, First Illinois Volunteer Infantry. Young as 
he was, he served his country in Mexico with distinction 
from the beginning to the end of the war — which found him 
acting quartermaster of his regiment. 

His many and varied experiences in this war, — the larger 
knowledge gained by him of men and things, — unquestion- 
ably had much influence in shaping Logan's brilliant subse- 
quent career. 

* For this and other incidents of the General's boyhood, together with other valuable 
information, the writer is indebted to Professor Thomas, entomologist at the Smithsonian 
Institution, a companion of Logan's youth, who subsequently married one of the General's 
sisters, now deceased. 



8 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

HIS RETURN FROM MEXICO TO PEACEFUL PURSUITS IS ELECTED 

TO AND RESIGNS HIS FIRST PUBLIC OFFICE READS LAW 

GRADUATES FROM LOUISVILLE UNIVERSITY COMMENCES THE 

PRACTICE OF LAW AN INCIDENT OF HIS PERSONAL COURAGE 

SERVES IN THE STATE LEGISLATURE. 

Returning home after the declaration of peace, our young 
hero determined to embrace the profession of the law, and 
resigning the county clerkship of Jackson County, to which 
the people had in 1849 elected him, he became a student in 
the Law Department of Louisville University. Here, by his 
rapid progress, he sustained, in an eminent degree, the san- 
guine expectations of his friends. After graduating with hon- 
ors, he returned to his old home at Murphysborough, formed 
a copartnership with his uncle, ex-Governor Jenkins, and at 
once began to acquire a lucrative practice, meeting at the bar 
some of the first lawyers of the State — men who have since 
made national reputations as eminent jurists. 

It was about this time occurred an instance of his per- 
sonal courage, which was then much talked of and made him 
many friends. The farmers of Southern Illinois had been 
much troubled by the incursions of a desperate gang of 
horse-thieves that rendezvoused in the swamps of Southeast- 
ern Missouri. They had recently made a new foray, and 
had stolen a number of horses from his neighbors. The suf- 
ferers held the gang in terror, and were afraid to follow and 
attempt the recovery of their property. Young Logan 
heard about this outrage, and taking two men with him, fol- 
lowed the outlaws into the swamps of Missouri, and soon re- 
turned with his neighbors' horses. Acute rheumatism — the 
seeds of which had doubtless been sown in his system by ex- 
posure during the war with Mexico — seized him on his re- 
turn, sixteen miles from home ; but he had accomplished his 
mission. 

In 1852, the people of the legislative district comprising 




MRS. GENERAL JOHN A. LOGAN. 



LOGAN BEFORE THE WAR. g 

the counties of Jackson and Franklin determined to run 
young Logan for representative in the State Legislature — a 
position occupied years before by his father ; and, although 
his competitor was well known, highly esteemed, and of 
great experience, Logan defeated him, and was elected by a 
large majority. 

ELECTED DISTRICT ATTORNEY HIS UNIFORM SUCCESS IN PROS- 
ECUTION AN INCIDENT OF HIS REMARKABLE SKILL IN DE- 
FENCE — HIS MARRIAGE AGAIN IN THE STATE LEGISLATURE. 

At the expiration of his legislative term, Mr. Logan re- 
sumed the active practice of his profession — one for which 
he was admirably fitted, and which he greatly enjoyed, his 
specialty being criminal jurisprudence ; and so successful 
was he in it that he was soon elected prosecuting attorney 
for the Third Judicial District. During his incumbency of 
that office Mr. Logan tried and convicted some of the most 
famous cases on the docket of that district ; and it is a re- 
markable fact that there is not a single instance in which he 
prosecuted that the guilty escaped conviction, nor was any 
one of his indictments ever quashed. 

On the other hand, an instance may be given of his skill 
in defence. It was while Mr. Logan was practising law at 
the bar of the same district. He was defending a man who 
with a knife had killed another in a dining-room, and who 
was indicted for murder. There was so strong a prejudice 
against the prisoner that he had taken a change of venue 
from Union to Polk County. The persons involved being 
prominent men, there was immense excitement as the time of 
trial arrived. The court-house, which stood in a large 
grass-covered square upon which some sheep stood brows- 
ing, was crammed with eager spectators. The evidence was 
all in, and the prosecution had finished its opening. As 
Logan arose to make his speech for the defence, a dog got 
among the sheep, and one of them bolted away from the 



io LIFE OF 10 G A IV. 

flock into the court-house, and up through the aisle to the 
very seat of justice, where it lay panting and trembling. 
With wonderful readiness and skill the advocate seized the 
incident, and, likening it to the sacrifice of the Paschal Lamb, 
made an appeal to the jury so powerful as to secure by his 
remarkable and effective oratory not alone the acquittal of 
the prisoner, but also the applause of those who had pre- 
viously believed him to be guilty. 

It was on November 27, 1855, that Mr. Logan married 
Miss Mary S. Cunningham, — a daughter of Captain J. M. 
Cunningham, his old friend and companion-in-arms of the 
Mexican war, — and, removing to Benton, established there 
his home and law-office. 

In 1856, the people again insisted upon his represent- 
ing them in the State Legislature, to which body he was 
elected in November during the famous " Fremont Cam- 
paign." During sessions of that Legislature he was con- 
spicuous in his advocacy of some of the most important 
measures devised for the best interests of the State — the in- 
tervals between sessions being devoted to the practice of his 
profession. 

LOGAN, THE CONGRESSMAN, BEFORE THE WAR AT THE 

CHARLESTON CONVENTION THE AUCTION-BLOCK AND SLAVE- 
PENS OF THE SOUTH HIS EFFORTS TO AVERT THE WAR. 

By 1858, his reputation both as lawyer and legislator had 
so widened that he was nominated as a Representative in 
the Thirty-sixth Congress, and, notwithstanding his compar- 
ative youth and the fact that his competitors numbered 
among them the most prominent men of the district (the 
Ninth), — which at that time comprised sixteen counties of 
Southern Illinois, — was triumphantly elected by the largest 
majority ever given to a Congressional Representative from 
that district. 

Congressman Logan took his seat December, 1858, at 



LOGAN BEFORE THE WAR. H 

what will be remembered as the most exciting period prior 
to the outbreak of the Rebellion. Stephen A. Douglas — 
"The Little Giant" — was then the leading Democrat of the 
Northwest, and especially of Illinois. It was to be expected, 
therefore, that Mr. Logan would defer to him, and, so far as 
he could with consistency, follow his lead in all matters of 
public weal. But even then, his impetuous spirit with diffi- 
culty brooked the insults daily heaped upon every man who 
dared to call a halt to the rampant fire-eaters then in Con- 
gress, who seemed bent upon ruling or ruining the Union. 
He worked incessantly for the welfare of his constituents, 
and so well did he succeed that, in November of i860, he 
was unanimously renominated and re-elected by an increased 
majority to the Thirty-seventh Congress. 

Mr. Logan attended the National Convention at Charles- 
ton, S. C, and for the first time beheld the veritable auction- 
block and slave-pens of the South. His generous nature re- 
volted at the barbarity of slavery, thus in its very nakedness 
brought right beneath his eyes, and his mind foresaw the 
fall of that inhuman " institution " at no distant day. He 
saw that the spirit of tyranny and oppression manifested by 
the leaders of the Democratic Party toward every man north 
of "Mason and Dixon's line" boded ill for them. He felt, 
as did every free man, that very soon must cease the forbear- 
ance that had been shown to men who knew no bounds to 
their demands, and who were ready to subordinate every- 
thing to their lust for wealth and power and the perpetua- 
tion of human slavery. Hence, when the Congress assem- 
bled in December, i860, he was in no frame of mind to 
endure the intensified fanaticism and threatening manner of 
the Southern Representatives. His speeches made at that 
time, as a Democrat, are replete with patriotic fire and love 
of the Union. Imbued with this spirit he was most active in 
striving to brinpf about what was known as the " Crittenden 
Compromise " — believing, as did many other patriotic men, 



I2 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

that that measure would avert the horrors of a civil war. 
But all effort seemed powerless before Fate. The tide was 
too strong. Boldly and bravely Mr. Logan exerted himself 
to breast it, urging moderation upon his party and its older 
leaders while eloquently avowing his own devotion to the 
Union and his abhorrence of the meditated treason. 

THE ABOLITION LEADER LOVEJOY THREATENED WITH VIOLENCE 

IN THE HOUSE FREE SPEECH ABOUT TO BE CHOKED — 

LOGAN COWES THE BLUSTERING FIRE-EATERS AND SECURES 
LOVEJOY A HEARING. 

The Southern Democrats had at that time full sway in 
Congress, and choked down the opposition, or at least at- 
tempted to prevent those from speaking who were sure to 
condemn slavery. Sumner was stricken down with a blud- 
geon for daring to utter his scathing denunciations of the 
crimes which were perpetrated in the name of liberty, and 
other eloquent and determined champions of freedom nar- 
rowly escaped similar violence. Free-speech in the Halls of 
Congress was imperilled. It was at this time that a scene 
occurred in the House, in which Logan was a principal fig- 
ure, that not only exhibited the personal intrepidity of " the 
gallant Egyptian," as he was then called, but that superior 
quality of moral courage which enables the very few who 
possess it to rise above party when that party consents to in- 
justice or assumes a despotic spirit. " On one occasion," says 
the narrator, " Mr. Lovejoy rose in his place in the House 
and attempted to speak, when several of the ' fire-eaters ' 
thrust their clenched fists in his face, and dared him to utter 
a sentence at the peril of his life. It was one of those ex- 
traordinary scenes when members become excited, leave their 
seats, and crowd around the occupant of the floor. Lovejoy 
— as brave a man as ever lived — expostulated with the furi- 
ous bowie-knife legislators, but they grew more and more 
fierce under his expostulations ; in fact, it looked as though 



LOGAN BEFORE THE WAR. 



13 



free-speech were about to be absolutely and by open violence 
choked down in the House of Representatives of the United 
States of America — the model Republic of the West. Mr. 
Lovejoy had a seat directly under the Speaker's desk, and 
turned around to look for aid, when a young man at the back 
end of the House rose, walked through the centre of the 
House, pushed through the excited members, reached Love- 
joy's side, pointed to him, and, turning to the Southern mem- 
bers, said, ' He is a representative from Illinois, the State 
that I was born in, and also have the honor to represent ; he 
must be allowed to speak without interruption, otherwise I 
will meet the coward or cowards outside of this House, and 
hold them responsible for further indignities offered to Mr. 
Lovejoy! This, of course, ended the display of clinched fists, 
and the lacerated despots took their seats, and Lovejoy made 
an able anti-slavery speech." The young man was Logan. 

THE BASELESS CHARGE THAT LOGAN WAS A " SECESSION SYM- 
PATHIZER BREAKING " OUT OF THE WAR OF REBELLION 

LOGAN LEAVES THE HOUSE, SHOULDERS A MUSKET, AND 
FIGHTS AT BULL RUN. 

It may be well right here to allude briefly to the base and 
baseless charge made by some of his enemies, that at the 
outbreak of the war, and prior to it, he was a " secession 
sympathizer," and to his triumphant refutation of the same, 
which may be found in the Congressional Record of April 20, 
1881. Senator Ben Hill of Georgia had the temerity to in- 
sinuate this charge in the United States Senate Chamber 
March 30, 1881. Logan instantly replied, "Any man who 
insinuates that I- sympathized with it at that time insinuates 
what is false," and Senator Hill at once retracted the cal- 
umny. Subsequently, April 19, 1881, a portion of the press 
having in the meantime insinuated further doubts, Senator 
Logan proved by the record, and by voluminous document- 
ary evidence, the utter falsity of the aspersion. That record 



14 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



shows that January 7, 1861, — while still a Douglas Democrat, 
before Lincoln's inauguration and before even the first gun 
of war was fired upon Fort Sumter, — he declared in Con- 
gress, as he voted for a resolution which approved the action 
taken by the President in support of the laws and for the 
preservation of the Union, that the resolution received his 
"unqualified approbation." Prior to that (December 17, 
i860) he had voted affirmatively on a resolution offered by 
Morris of Illinois, which declared an " immovable attach- 
ment " to " our National Union," and "that it is our patriotic 
duty to stand by it, as our hope in peace and our defence in 
war." In a speech he made February 5, 1861, on the " Crit- 
tenden Compromise," he declared that " he had always de- 
nied, and did yet deny, the right of secession." And when 
he concluded his speech of vindication in the Senate, even the 
Bourbon Senator Brown of Georgia declared it to be " full, 
complete, and conclusive." In future, then, no truthful man 
will dare to say that Logan was not true to the Union and 
opposed to secession " before the war, at the beginning of 
the war, and all through the war." * 

At last the crisis came when every man must take his 
stand either for or against his country. The dreaded can- 
nons' roar was heard above Fort Moultrie, and, with that 
sound, redoubled threats of a forcible dismemberment of this 
Union. Logan saw that the enemy could no longer be 
stayed in his wicked infatuation ; that the time for action had 
arrived ; and hurriedly leaving unanswered a " call of the 
House," he crossed the Potomac and, musket in hand, fought 
as a private in the ranks all day long in the first battle of 
Bull Run — being among the last to leave the field. 

* For fuller evidence on this point see pp. 288-292. 



PART II. 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. 

GENERAL MCCOOK DESCRIBES LOGAN AT BULL RUN — LOGAN RE- 
TURNS TO WASHINGTON AND TO " EGYPT " THE SACRIFICES 

HE MADE FOR THE UNION CAUSE THE MAGICAL EFFECT OF 

HIS PATRIOTIC ELOQUENCE UPON A HOWLING MOB HOW HE 

TURNED SECESSION SYMPATHIZERS INTO UNION SOLDIERS 

HOW SOUTHERN ILLINOIS WAS SAVED TO THE UNION — THE 
EFFECT OF HIS GREAT INFLUENCE THERE. 

Touching the first Bull Run, General Anson G. McCook, 
now Secretary of the United States Senate, himself a gallant 
soldier in the war and a participant, as captain of the Second 
Ohio, in that battle, narrated to the writer the following 
characteristic incident. Said he : 

It was, I think, on July 18th, three clays before the battle proper. 
We were making a reconnoissance at Blackburn's Ford, when I heard 
artillery-firing, and went to the front to see what was going on. Shortly 
after, musketry-firing began in the valley, and our men commenced to 
fall back, when I noticed two men in citizen's dress among the soldiers. 
One was my uncle, Daniel McCook ; the other, a man I had never be- 
fore seen, but whose striking personal appearance and actions at once 
arrested my attention. He wore a silk hat, which seemed strangely in- 
congruous on a battlefield in a crowd of soldiers. He was a man of 
alert and vigorous frame, swarthy complexion, long and heavy black 
mustache and black eyes. His hands were bloody, a rifle was on his 
shoulder, and while at one moment he was helping to carry off some 
wounded man, at another, with blazing eyes and language more forci- 
ble than polite, he strove to rally the men. I afterward asked my uncle 
who that man was, and he told me it was John A. Logan, the Illinois 
Congressman. 



16 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

Returning to Washington, Mr. Logan telegraphed and 
wrote home to Colonel White and others to raise troops in 
defence of the Union, and hurried back to his district at the 
close of the session to tell his people of his intention to fol- 
low the flag of his country, and, if need be, " hew his way 
to the Gulf."* 

No man in the nation made greater sacrifices at this su- 
preme moment than did Logan. Resolutions favoring seces- 
sion had already been adopted by his constituents. At his 
own home, excitement ran high, and all one way. Almost 
every tie he had, save that of his patriotic wife, was arrayed 
against him. He had been the pride and the idol of his peo- 
ple, but now they spurned him, and heaped upon him the 
bitterest denunciation. Party ties were rent asunder, and 
persecution and abuse followed him everywhere. Threats 
of personal violence were made. So inflamed indeed was 
the public mind, that deeds of open defiance to the Govern- 
ment were imminent. There are persons now living who 
witnessed and will never forget the wonderful magnetic influ- 
ence of Mr. Logan over men as exhibited at that stormy 
time, when,f mounting a wagon in the public square at 

* It was upon the occasion of a presentation of a flag to his regiment, the Thirty-first 
Illinois, by the citizens of his native county, that Colonel Logan made use of the following 
emphatic language : " Should the free navigation of the Mississippi River be obstructed by 
force, the men of the West will hew their way through human gore to the Gulf of Mexico." 

+ Another instance of the remarkable effect of Mr. Logan's patriotic fervor, which oc- 
curred shortly before this, is narrated by General Grant in his Personal Memoirs. It 
seems that when Grant " was appointed colonel " of the Twenty-first Illinois Regiment, 
it was "still in the State service," and in camp, at " Camp Dick Yates,'' near Springfield. 
The time arrived for such of his "ninety days" regiment as would volunteer "for three 
years or the war" to be mustered into the service of the United States. Congressmen 
McClernand and Logan being at Springfield, 111., met Grant, and then addressed his doubt- 
ful regiment. Says Grant: "McClernand spoke first; and Logan followed in a speech 
which he has hardly equalled since for force and eloquence. It breathed a loyalty and de- 
votion to the Union which inspired my men to such a point that they would have volun- 
teered to remain in the army as long as an enemy of the country continued to bear arms 
against it. They entered the United States service almost to a man." Grant adds this fur- 
ther tribute : " General Logan went to his part of the State and gave his attention to rais- 
ing troops. The very men who at first made it necessary to guard the roads in South- 




1. GENERAL LOGAN'S BIRTHPLACE. 2. CALUMET PLACE— GENERAL LOGAN'S WASHINGTON RESIDENCE. 

8. VIEW OF HALL AND GRAND STAIRWAY 4. LIBRARY. 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. jy 

Marion, Williamson County, — which was now his place of 
residence, — he addressed a vast multitude of infuriated peo- 
ple, who, strongly sympathizing with the South, were little 
less than a turbulent, howling mob. When Logan com- 
menced to speak, it was with difficulty the mob-spirit could 
be restrained so that he could gain a hearing ; but before he 
had finished the vivid picture he painted, in words of living 
light, of the inevitable consequences of treason and disunion 
to them, their children, and their country, they stood abso- 
lutely spellbound, and many were even ready to enlist in 
defence of that very flag which but a few moments before 
they would have stamped upon. And when he closed his 
glowing periods and told them he was going to enlist for the 
war ("as a private, or in any capacity in which he could 
serve his country best in defending the old blood-stained flag 
over every foot of soil in the United States"), they swarmed 
about him, and sent up such a shout as has rarely been 
heard. A friend and fellow-comrade of Logan's in the Mexi- 
can War, having in the meantime hurriedly hunted up an 
old fifer and drummer, was the first to shout, " Come on, 
boys ! Let's go with Logan. Where he leads, we can fol- 
low ! " Suiting action to the words, the fife and drum struck 
up the familiar tune of "Yankee Doodle," and before they 
had marched half-way around the square, one hundred gal- 
lant fellows were in line, " keeping step to the music of the 
Union," each pledged to serve his country for three years, 
unless sooner discharged by peace being declared. 

The midnight travelling and daily speaking and enlisting 
of soldiers for the war, during the ensuing ten days, can 

era Illinois became the defenders of the Union. Logan entered the service himself as 
colonel of a regiment, and rapidly rose to the rank of major-general. His district, which 
had promised at first to give much trouble to the Government, filled every call made upon 
it for troops, without resorting to the draft. There was no call made when there were not 
more volunteers than were asked for. That Congressional District stands credited at the 
War Department to-day with furnishing more men for the army than it was called on to 
supply." 

2 



1 8 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

scarcely be described. The conversion of an entire people 
from sympathy for their kindred and friends in the South into 
patriotic soldiers ready to fight against them, was little short 
of miraculous. The sharp struggle between duty and incli- 
nation ; the actual taking up of arms, and leaving loved ones 
behind while on the way to fight other loved ones in front ; 
the sacrifice of all other ties for the sake of patriotic principle 
and the maintenance and preservation of the unity of the 
States — how trying an ordeal ! And yet, despite all these 
heart-bursting difficulties and struggles, from which none but 
the noblest of men could find the true course, in ten days the 
grand old Thirty-first Illinois Volunteer Infantry Regiment, 
with Lo^an at its head, was en route for Cairo, the rendez- 
vous of the first soldiers enlisted in Southern Illinois. From 
that hour the whole surrounding country seemed to catch 
the infection of patriotism, and Colonel Logan's regiment, 
the Thirty-first Illinois Infantry, — which was quickly fol- 
lowed by the Twenty-second, Twenty-seventh, and Thir- 
tieth Regiments, — was at once organized with others into 
McClernand's First Brigade under Grant. Thus South- 
ern Illinois was saved to the Union, and the indescrib- 
able calamity of guerilla warfare averted from the soil of 
Logan's native State. What might have happened, had any 
portion of Illinois lying south of the Ohio and Mississippi 
Railroad joined in an attempt at secession, we care not now 
to contemplate. That Cairo, as a base for our armies, when 
they embarked for the Tennessee, Mississippi, and the whole 
Southern field, was of inestimable importance, none can deny. 
Nor can it be disputed that to Logan, more than to any other 
one man, is due the gallant and patriotic stand the Southern 
Illinoisans took ; nor that its influence was felt in a very 
marked degree in Indiana and other adjacent States, and 
nerved the hearts of Union men everywhere, giving fresh im- 
pulse to Northern courage. 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. lg 



COLONEL LOGAN AT BELMONT A CHARACTERISTIC DESCRIPTION 

OF HIM DURING THAT BATTLE HIS BRAVERY AND "ADMIRA- 
BLE TACTICS " HIS HORSE SHOT UNDER HIM. 

As a soldier, Colonel Logan brought into play all the en- 
thusiasm, energy, and indomitable will which always char- 
acterized him. He drilled and disciplined his regiment him- 
self, and six weeks after the enlistment of his men led them 
into battle at Belmont, Mo. There, the force of General 
Grant being landed from the transports convoyed by the gun- 
boats Tyler and Lexington, the line of battle was formed, 
with Logan and his Thirty-first Illinois Infantry Regiment on 
the left. 

The Hon. Lewis Hauback, now a member of the House of 
Representatives from Kansas, narrated* in the presence of 
the writer an interesting characteristic incident of Loo-an at 
this fight. Said he : " It was at Belmont that I first saw 
John A. Logan. There were five regiments of us there — 
among them the Twenty-seventh Illinois Infantry, to which 
I belonged, and the Thirty-first Illinois — Logan's regi- 
ment. I remember the Twenty-seventh — my regiment — held 
the right of the line of battle. I was orderly-sergeant, and 
accordingly was on the left of my regiment. On our imme- 
diate left, and joining it, was the Thirty-first. Logan sat 
his big black horse, therefore, nearly in front of me. Our 
colonel — a brave and gallant man too he was — rode up to 
Logan and said, rather pompously ' Colonel Logan, remem- 
ber, if you please, that /have the position of honor ! ' With- 
out turning to right or left, Logan instantly replied, ' I don't 
care a d — n where I am, so long as I get into this fight ! ' 
And ' get into ' it he soon did, as he fought his way up to 

* Dimng his eloquent speech at the ex- soldiers' and sailors' serenade to General Logan 
at Washington, June 21, 1S84, after the nomination of the latter for Vice-President of the 
United States. 



20 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

and into the camp and tore down the ensign of treason and 
planted in its stead the flag of beauty and of glory." 
An account of this early battle says : 

The advance was a continuous running fight. Every inch of ground 
was hotly contested. The scene became terrific : men grappled with 
men, column charged upon column, musketry rattled, cannon thundered 
and tore frightful gaps in the contending forces. But unable to win 
against such formidable odds, the command to fall back was given (to 
avoid being cut off from the gunboats), and the soldiers of the North 
fought their way back even as they had forward. 

Of Colonel Logan in this engagement the official report 
says: 

Colonel Logan's admirable tactics not only foiled the frequent at- 
tempts of the enemy to flank him, but secured a steady advance toward 
the enemy's camp. 

It was on this occasion that, in a moment of victory, Mc- 
Clernand's command, being given over to rejoicing, was much 
demoralized, and exposed to danger should the enemy rein- 
force and return. This the enemy was doing when Colonel 
Logan discovered him, instantly formed his command, and re- 
pulsing the attack, succeeded in getting the entire command 
on board. It was during a successful bayonet-charge at this 
battle that Logan's horse was shot under him and his pistol 
at his side shattered to pieces by the fire of the enemy. Gen- 
eral McClernand complimented the regiment upon its unex- 
ampled bravery, and Colonel Logan for having cut his way 
three times through an overwhelming force of the enemy, 
thus opening the way for the return of the army. 

The design of the expedition was the breaking up of the 
enemy's encampment at Belmont. Having accomplished it, 
the Union troops returned to Cairo with many prisoners. 

The discomforts of the raw troops in Cairo at that time 
were very great, and much harder to bear than the greater 
hardships which they subsequently bore as veterans. They 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. 2I 

had left their homes and comfortable surroundings quite un- 
prepared for the life of a soldier. Their equipage was poor, 
as neither quartermasters nor purveyors had yet learned how 
to properly prepare for the needs of troops. Colonel Logan, 
with that solicitude for the well-being of his men which always 
distinguished him, and for which, together with his military 
skill and daring, they idolized him, finally went to Washing- 
ton and arranged for arms and clothing suitable for his com- 
mand, although, owing to the confusion incident to the hurried 
preparations for war, it was almost impossible to obtain much- 
needed supplies of any character. 

LOGAN AT FORT HENRY HE IS THE FIRST TO ENTER IT HIS 

INTREPIDITY AND SKILL AT FORT DONELSON HE IS 

WOUNDED AND CARRIED FROM THE FIELD, HAVING EARNED 
A BRIGADIER-GENERALSHIP. 

The plan for the campaign in the Southwest having been 
perfected, the troops were embarked upon ordinary Western 
river steamboats to go up the Ohio to the Tennessee River, to 
strike and dislodge the enemy at Fort Henry — a work quickly 
done. Logan commanded his regiment through the most 
trying circumstances in the rear of Fort Henry. He was the 
first of the army to enter the captured fort, and, in command 
of two hundred cavalry, pursued and captured eight of the 
enemy's guns. This was the first decisive triumph of the 
Union arms upon Western waters, and "on to Donelson !" 
was the cry of every tongue. Colonel Logan made several 
reconnoissances around Fort Donelson preparatory to the 
movement of our forces on that point. In the fiercest storms 
of a severe winter, after the fall of Fort Henry, the Union 
cavalry, infantry, and artillery were landed and marched across 
the country to Fort Donelson, a much more formidable forti- 
fication on the Cumberland River, which had been erected 
for the defence of Nashville and the whole section of country 
thereabout. The gunboats pushed up the river to shell the 



22 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

fort in front, while the command marched rapidly to the rear 
of the works, despite sleet, rain, almost impassable mud, and 
bitter cold. For three days the Union forces besieged Fort 
Donelson, doing some gallant fighting all along the line, in 
which Colonel Logan's regiment was constantly engaged. 
The lamented Ransom and Logan, respectively with the 
Eleventh and Thirty-first Illinois Infantry, with inflexible 
courage held their positions notwithstanding they received 
the heaviest fire of the enemy and sustained the sudden and 
simultaneous attack of an immense mass of Confederate in- 
fantry which had been hurled on McClernand's crumbling di- 
vision at the rieht of Grant's line of investment. It was in the 
afternoon of the third day, after the naval attack by Foote's 
gunboats had been repulsed, when the Eleventh and Thirty- 
first Illinois, the latter commanded by the intrepid Logan, 
stood like a wall of belching fire against the enemy, until both 
had nearly exhausted their cartridges and had suffered greatly 
in killed and wounded,* — among the killed in the Thirty-first 
Illinois being their lieutenant-colonel (White) and the senior 
captain (Williamson), and among the wounded Colonel Logan 
himself, — that Logan, regardless of a severe wound in his left 
arm and shoulder and a flesh wound in the thigh, his left side 
streaming with blood, maintained his seat on his horse, and by 
his bravery and daring and influence over them, rallied his men 
to fresh exertion and held them in position f until from ex- 
haustion and loss of blood he was carried from the field. The 
wounds were so severe that for weeks his life was despaired 
of. 

* Of the 606 men of Logan's regiment who went into the fight, but 303 answered to 
their names the next morning. 

f It was about this time, when Lieutenant-Colonel White had been killed, and officers 
and men were falling, killed or wounded, by scores and hundreds, there came a moment 
when even the wonderful courage of the gallant Thirty-first Illinois seemed to waver. Its 
colonel, Logan, saw the momentary hesitation, and, with trumpet voice, on the instant, 
came the words from his lips : "Boys! give us death, but not dishonor!" These words, 
and the inspiration of Lis flashing eye and martial bearing, steadied his lines at once, and 
the brave fellows fought better than ever. 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. 2 ~ 

In his official reports of the battles of Fort Henry and 
Fort Donelson, General McClernand, commanding the First 
Division, speaks highly of Colonel Logan's conduct in them. 
Touching Fort Donelson, McClernand says : 

Schwartz's battery being left unsupported, by the retirement of the 
Twenty-ninth, the Thirty-first boldly rushed to its defence, and at the 
same moment received the combined attack of the forces on the right 
[under Polk] and of others in front, supposed to have been led by Gen- 
eral Buckner, The danger was imminent, and calling for a change of 
disposition adapted to meet it, which Colonel Logan made by forming 
the right wing of his battalion at an angle with the left. In this order 
he supported the battery, which continued to play upon the enemy and 
held him in check until his regiment's supply of ammunition was en- 
tirely exhausted. 

The report of Colonel Oglesby of the eighth Illinois, com- 
manding the First Brigade, also says : 

Turning to the Thirty-first, which yet held its place in line, I or- 
dered Colonel Logan to throw back his right, so as to form a crotchet 
on the right of the Eleventh Illinois. In this way Colonel Logan held 
in check the advancing foe for some time, under the most destructive 
fire, while I endeavored to assist Colonel Cruft with his brigade in 
finding a position on the right of the Thirty-first. It was now four 
hours since fighting began in the morning. The cartridge-boxes of 
the Thirty-first were nearly empty. The colonel had been severely 
wounded, and the lieutenant-colonel, John H. White, had, with some 
thirty others, fallen dead on the field, and a large number wounded. In 
this condition Colonel Logan brought off the remainder of his regiment 
in good order. 

Says another writer : 

The annals of the war speak of General Logan as being where dan- 
ger was the greatest and the blows of death the thickest and most 
heavy, and no name is inscribed more brightly upon the roll of honor 
of Donelson. 

The " unconditional surrender " of Fort Donelson, Feb- 
ruary 16, 1862, was a heavy shock to the South, and corre- 
spondingly swelled with joy the Northern heart. 



24 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

At this distance of time it is hard to realize what was en- 
dured by our Union soldiers at Donelson. The cold was of 
such intensity that the hands and feet of many of them were 
frozen. Everything was covered with a thick crust of ice, 
and the sleet continued to fall heavily and ceaselessly day 
and night during the siege. The besiegers were, moreover, 
so close to the fortifications that no fires could be lighted, and 
neither officers nor men had anything to eat save the insuffi- 
cient, cold cooked rations in their haversacks. Nor had they 
anything to protect them from the pitiless driving storm ; and 
to keep their powder dry taxed their vigilance to the utmost. 

The following letter exhibits the fact that Colonel Logan's 
conduct at this siege had attracted the personal attention of 
General Grant: 

Headquarters District West Tennessee, 
Fort Henry, March 14, 1862. 
Hon. E. M. Stanton, Secretary of War, Washington, D. C. : 

I have been waiting for reports of sub-commanders at the battle of 
Fort Donelson to make some recommendations of officers for advance- 
ment for meritorious services. These reports are not yet in, and as the 
troops under my command are actively engaged, may not be for some 
time. I therefore take this occasion to make some recommendations 
of officers who in my opinion should not be neglected. I would particu- 
larly mention the names of Colonel J. D. Webster, First Illinois Artil- 
lery ; Morgan L. Smith, Eighth Missouri Volunteers ; W. H. L. Wal- 
lace, Eleventh Illinois Volunteers ; and John A. Logan, Thirty-first 
Illinois Volunteers. The two former are old soldiers, and men of de- 
cided merit. The two latter are from civil pursuits, but I have no 
hesitation in fully indorsing them as in every way qualified for the po- 
sition of brigadier-general, and think they have fully earned the posi- 
tion on the field of battle. There are others who may be equally 
meritorious, but I do not happen to know so well their services. 

U. S. Grant, 
Major- General. 

For his gallantry in the reduction of Donelson, Colonel 
Logan was accordingly promoted to be a brigadier-general 
of volunteers. For some time he was confined by his wounds 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. 2 c 

to his bed ; but so impatient was he to return to his com- 
mand, that, with his wounds still unhealed, he essayed to do 
so, although unable to wear a coat, as soon as he was able to 
sit up. He reached his command on the evening of the bat- 
tle of Shiloh, April 7, 1862, just too late to participate in the 
engagement — much to his disappointment. 

GENERAL LOGAN IN COMMAND OF A BRIGADE HIS SERVICES AT 

AND ABOUT CORINTH GENERAL SHERMAN^ APPRECIATION 

OF THEM. 

Being assigned to the command of the First Brigade, 
Third Division of the Seventeenth Army Corps, General 
Logan took a distinguished part in the movement against 
Corinth ; and, had his suggestions been acted upon, that 
vast fortified encampment, with the enemy encamped therein, 
would have been captured, instead of being merely occupied 
after the enemy had evacuated it.* After the occupation of 
Corinth, General Logan guarded with his brigade the rail- 
road communications with Jackson, Tenn., of which place he 
was subsequently given the command, and engaged in re- 
building the railroad to Jackson and Columbus. 

General Sherman, in his official report of the siege of 
Corinth, dated " Camp near Corinth, May 30, 1862," says: 

Colonel John A. Logan's brigade, of General Judah's division of 
McClernand's reserve corps, and General Veatch's brigade, of Hurlbut's 
division, were placed subject to my orders, and took an important part 

* The over-cautious Halleck, and others of his generals, believed that the noise of in- 
coming and departing trains within the enemy's lines at Corinth, coupled with the occasional 
loud cheering of Beauregard's men, indicated the arrival of heavy reinforcements of the 
enemy, and expected him to come out and offer battle outside his lines. Logan, however, 
whose troops were on the railroad, was satisfied that an evacuation was going on, because, 
by listening close to the rails, the difference in the sound caused by the incoming unloaded 
cars and the outgoing loaded ones was quite distinguishable, and Beauregard's ruse of 
heavy cheers when the unloaded cars steamed in did not deceive him. Logan therefore 
suggested an immediate attack on the enemy's position, and asked permission to himself 
make it with his command. That permission was refused, and the enemy escaped, to the 
intense chagrin of the "Grand Army" of the Union. 



2 6 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

with my own division in the operations of the two following days, viz., 
May 2S and May 29, 1862 ; and I now thank the officers and men of 
those brigades, for the zeal and enthusiasm they manifested and the 
alacrity they displayed in the execution of every order given. . . . 
And further, I feel under special obligations to this officer, General 
Logan, who, during the two days he served under me, held critical 
ground on my right, extending down to the railroad. All that time he 
had in his front a large force of the enemy, but so dense was the foliage 
that he could not reckon their strength save from what he could see in 
the railroad track. 

LOGAN SOLICITED TO RETURN TO CONGRESS HIS GRANDLY 

PATRIOTIC REFUSAL — " I HAVE ENTERED THE FIELD TO DIE, 

IF NEED BE, FOR THIS GOVERNMENT" HIS ONLY POLITICS, 

HIS "ATTACHMENT FOR THE UNION." 

In the summer of 1862, General Logan was warmly urged 
by his numerous friends and admirers in Illinois to become a 
candidate for re-election to Congress as a Representative-at- 
Large, but in a letter addressed to the Secretary of State of 
Illinois, glowing with the fires of true patriotism, General 
Lo^an answered : 

I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your complimentary 
letter of the 18th inst., asking permission to use my name in connection 
with that of Representative for the Fourteenth Congressional District 
of the State of Illinois. 

In reply I would most respectfully remind you that a compliance 
with your request on my part would be a departure from the settled 
resolution with which I resumed my sword in defence and for the per- 
petuity of a Government, the like and blessings of which no other na- 
tion or age shall enjoy if once suffered to be weakened or destroyed. 

In making this reply, I feel that it is unnecessary to enlarge as to 
what were, are, or may hereafter be, my political views, but would sim- 
ply state that politics of every grade and character whatsoever are now 
ignored by me, since I am convinced that the Constitution and life of 
this Republic, which I shall never cease to adore, are in danger. 

I express all my views and politics when I assert my attachment for 
the Union. I have no other politics now, and consequently no aspira- 
tions for civil place and power. 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. 2 y 

No ! I am to-day a soldier of this Republic, so to remain, change- 
less and immutable, until her last and weakest enemy shall have expired 
and passed away. 

Ambitious men, who have not a true love for their country at heart, 
may bring forth crude and bootless questions to agitate the pulse of 
our troubled nation, and thwart the preservation of this Union ; but 
for none of such am I. I have entered the field — to die if need be — 
for this Government, and never expect to return to peaceful pursuits 
until the object of this war of preservation has become a fact estab- 
lished. 

Whatever means it may be necessary to adopt, whatever local inter- 
est it may affect or destroy, is no longer an affair of mine. If any lo- 
cality or section suffers or is wronged in the prosecution of the war, I 
am sorry for it ; but I say that it must not be heeded now, for we are 
at war for the preservation of the Union. Let the evil be rectified 
when the present breach has been cemented forever. 

If the South by her malignant treachery has imperiled all that made 
her great and wealthy, and it has to be lost, I would not stretch forth 
my hand to save her from destruction, if she will not be saved by a 
restoration of the Union. Since the die of her wretchedness has been 
cast by her own hands, let the coin of her misery circulate alone in her 
own dominions, until the peace of union ameliorates her forlorn con- 
dition. 

By these few words you may readily discern that my political as- 
pirations are things of the past, and I am not the character of man you 
seek. No legislation in which I might be suffered to take a feeble part 
will in my opinion suffice to amend the injury already inflicted upon 
our country by these remorseless traitors. Their policy for the disso- 
lution of the Government was initiated in blood, and their seditious 
blood only can suffice to make amends for the evil done. This Govern- 
ment must be preserved for future generations in the same mould in 
which it was transmitted to us, if it takes the last man and the last 
dollar of the present generation within its borders to accomplish it. 

For the flattering manner in which you have seen fit to allude to 
my past services, I return you my sincere thanks ; but if it has been 
my fortune to bleed and suffer for my dear country, it is all but too 
little compared to what I am willing again and again to endure : and 
should fate so ordain it, I will esteem it as the highest privilege a Just 
Dispenser can award, to shed the last drop of blood in my veins for the 
honor of that flag whose emblems are justice, liberty, and truth, and 
which has been, and as I humbly trust in God ever will be, for the 
risfht. 



2 8 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

In conclusion, let me request that your desire to associate my name 
with the high and honorable position you would confer upon me be at 
once dismissed, and some more suitable and worthy person substituted. 
Meanwhile I shall continue to look with unfeigned pride and admira- 
tion on the continuance of the present able conduct of our State affairs, 
and feel that I am sufficiently honored while acknowledged as an hum- 
ble soldier of our own peerless State. 

GENERAL LOGAN LEADS THE ADVANCE IN THE NORTHERN 

MISSISSIPPI CAMPAIGN THE RETURN TO MEMPHIS, TENN. 

THE CAMPAIGN TO, AND BEFORE, VICKSBURG LOGAN IN COM- 
MAND OF THE THIRD DIVISION OF M c PHERSON's CORPS 

PATRIOTIC ADDRESS TO HIS SOLDIERS AT MEMPHIS. 

From Corinth, General Logan with his matchless men 
pressed forward, under Grant, to Vicksburg — that " Gibraltar 
of the Confederacy." It was during Grant's Northern Mis- 
sissippi Campaign (1862-63) that Logan was promoted to be 
a Major-General of Volunteers (his commission dating from 
November 29, 1862). Those who are familiar with the story 
of that campaign will remember that General Logan's com- 
mand led the advance all the way, in the toilsome marches 
and skirmishes, from Corinth down through Holly Springs 
and Oxford, to the Yocnapatanfa, where the campaign 
ended. 

In the attempt to take Vicksburg in the rear, made by 
General Grant in the fall of 1862, General Logan commanded 
the First Division of the right wing of the Seventeenth Corps, 
so denominated, which was organized at Bolivar, Tenn. The 
command of General Logan in this campaign was the main 
reliance of the commanding General (U. S. Grant), and to 
him was he indebted for the discipline and good order in 
which the troops finally reached Memphis on their return, 
December 31, 1862. 

Upon arrival at Memphis, Tenn., the Seventeenth Corps, 
under orders from the War Department, was organized, Gen- 
eral Logan being assigned, January 11, 1863, to the command 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. 2g 

of its Third Division — which command he continued to hold 
until after the fall of Vicksburg. Here it was that he issued 
the following patriotic address to his fellow-soldiers, urging 
them in a most stirring and spirited manner to fresh exertions 
for their country, and nerving them for the deeds of desperate 
daring that were before them : 

Headquarters Third Division, Seventeenth Army Corps, 
Memphis, Tenn., February 12, 1863. 

My Fellow-Soldiers : Debility from recent illness has prevented 
and still prevents me from appearing among you, as has been my 
custom and is my desire. It is for this cause I deem it my duty to com- 
municate with you now, and give you the assurance that your general 
still maintains unshaken confidence in your patriotism, devotion, and in 
the ultimate success of our glorious cause. 

I am aware that influences of the most discouraging and treasonable 
character, well calculated and designed to render you dissatisfied, have 
recently been brought to bear upon some of you by professed friends. 
Newspapers, containing treasonable articles, artfully falsifying the 
public sentiment at your homes, have been circulated in your camps. 
Intriguing political tricksters, demagogues, and time-servers, whose cor- 
rupt deeds are but a faint reflex of their more corrupt hearts, seem 
determined to drive our people on to anarchy and destruction. They 
have hoped, by magnifying the reverses of our arms, basely misrepre- 
senting the conduct and slandering the character of our soldiers in the 
field, and boldly denouncing the acts of the constituted authorities of 
the Government as unconstitutional usurpations, to produce general 
demoralization in the army, and thereby reap their political reward, 
weaken the cause we have espoused, and aid those arch-traitors of the 
South to dismember our mighty Republic, and trail in the dust the em- 
blem of our national unity, greatness, and glory. Let me remind you, 
my countrymen, that we are Soldiers of the Federal Union, armed for 
the preservation of the Federal Constitution and the maintenance of 
its laws and authority. Upon your faithfulness and devotion, heroism 
and gallantry, depend its perpetuity. To us has been committed this 
sacred inheritance, baptized in the blood of our fathers. We are sol- 
diers of a Government that has always blessed us with prosperity and 
happiness. 

It has given to every American citizen the largest freedom and the 
most perfect equality of rights and privileges. It has afforded us se- 



3 o LIFE OF IOGAN. 

curity in person and property, and blessed us until, under its beneficial 
influence, we were the proudest nation on earth. 

We should be united in our efforts to put down a rebellion that 
now, like an earthquake, rocks the nation from State to State and from 
centre to circumference, and threatens to ingulf us all in one common 
ruin, the horrors of which no pen can portray. We have solemnly 
sworn to bear true faith to this Government, preserve its Constitution, 
and defend its glorious flag against all its enemies and opposers. To 
our hands has been committed the liberties, the prosperity and happi- 
ness of future generations. Shall we betray such a trust ? Shall the 
brilliance of your past achievements be dimmed and tarnished by hesi- 
tation, discord, and dissension, while armed traitors menace you in 
front and unarmed traitors intrigue against you in the rear? We are 
in no way responsible for any action of the civil authorities. We con- 
stitute the military arm of the Government. That the civil power is 
threatened and attempted to be paralyzed is the reason for resort to the 
military power. To aid the civil authorities (not to oppose or ob- 
struct) in the exercise of their authority, is our office ; and shall we 
forget this duty, and stop to wrangle and dispute over this or that po- 
litical act or measure while the country is bleeding at every pore ; 
while a fearful wail of anguish, wrung from the heart of a distracted 
people, is borne upon every breeze, and widows and orphans are ap- 
pealing to us to avenge the loss of their loved ones who have fallen by 
our side in defence of the old blood-stained banner, and while the 
Temple of Liberty itself is being shaken to its very centre by the ruth- 
less blows of traitors, who have desecrated our flag, obstructed our na- 
tional highways, destroyed our peace, desolated our firesides, and 
draped thousands of homes in mourning ? 

Let us stand firm at our posts of duty and of honor, yielding a 
cheerful obedience to all orders from our superiors, until by our united 
efforts the Stars and Stripes shall be planted in every city, town, and 
hamlet of the rebellious States. We can then return to our homes, 
and through the ballot-box peacefully redress all our wrongs, if any we 
have. 

While I rely upon you with confidence and pride, I blush to confess 
that recently some of those who were once our comrades-in-arms have 
so far forgotten their honor, their oaths, and their country as to shame- 
fully desert us, and skulkingly make their way to their homes, where 
like culprits they dare not look an honest man in the face. Disgrace 
and ignominy (if they escape the penalty of the law) will not only fol- 
low them to their dishonored graves, but will stamp their names and 
lineage with infamy to the latest generation. The scorn and contempt 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. ^1 

of every true man will ever follow those base men, who, forgetful of 
their oaths, have, like cowardly spaniels, deserted their comrades-in- 
arms in the face of the foe, and their country in the hour of its greatest 
peril. Every true-hearted mother or father, brother, sister, or wife, 
will spurn the coward who could thus not only disgrace himself, but 
his name and his kindred. An indelible stamp of infamy should be 
branded upon his cheek, that all who look upon his vile countenance 
may feel for him the contempt his cowardice merits. Could I believe 
that such conduct found either justification or excuse in your hearts, or 
that you would for a moment falter in our glorious purpose of saving 
the nation from threatened wreck and hopeless ruin, I would invoke 
from Deity, as the greatest boon, a common grave to save us from such 
infamy and disgrace. 

The day is not far distant when traitors and cowards North and 
South will cower before the indignation of an outraged people. March 
bravely onward ! Nerve your strong arms to the task of overthrowing 
every obstacle in the pathway of victory, until with shouts of triumph 
the last gun is fired that proclaims us a United People under the old 
flag and one Government ! Patriot soldiers ! This great work accom- 
plished, the reward for such service as yours will be realized ; the bless- 
ings and honors of a grateful people will be yours. 

John A. Logan, 
Brigadier- General Commanding. 

CANALLING AT LAKE PROVIDENCE A BOLD PROPOSAL LO- 

GAN'S MEN " MAN " THE TRANSPORTS THAT RUN THE TER- 
RIBLE FIRE OF VICKSBURG'S GUNS. 

From Memphis, General Logan's division was embarked 
on transports and proceeded to Lake Providence (near 
Vicksburg), where, amid their watery surroundings, efforts 
were made to construct the famous canal, until the impatient 
spirit of leader and men would no longer quietly await the 
results of the tedious experiment of canal-digging, but boldly 
proposed to run past the frowning cannon of Vicksburg, in 
vessels shielded only by bales of cotton piled up on either 
side to protect the brave fellows who volunteered for the 
dangerous service. General Lop-an's command moved from 
Lake Providence February 22, 1S63, reaching Milliken's 



3 2 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

Bend April 25th, and thence proceeded by way of Carthage 
and Perkins' Plantation to Hard Times Landing, below 
Grand Gulf. Meanwhile the transports, — manned almost 
exclusively by volunteers * from Logan's division, — with their 
valuable freights, and crews of human souls, had, with ar- 
rowy speed, in the night, swept past the belching batteries 
of Vicksburg comparatively unharmed by the storms of shot 
and shell that poured upon them. Having thus secured 
transports with which the troops could be crossed over the 
Mississippi River, work was now to commence in real ear- 
nest and to some purpose. On the morning of May 1st, 
General Logan's division was ferried across the river in these 
vessels, and was at once pushed toward Port Gibson, where 
General McClernand was engaging the enemy, and attempt- 
ing without success to drive him from his position. 

THE VICTORY OF FORT GIBSON — LOGAN'S MEN DETERMINE THE 

BATTLE OF THE BIG BLACK LOGAN FLANKS THE ENEMY, 

AND DRIVES HIM AGAIN CONSEQUENT EVACUATION OF 

GRAND GULF THE ROAD TO VICKSBURG NOW OPEN. 

The official report of General Grant says : 

McClernand, who was with the right in person, sent repeated mes- 
sages to me before the arrival of Logan, to send Logan's and Quimby's 
divisions to him. Osterhaus, of McClernand's corps, did not move the 
enemy from the position occupied by him on our left until Logan's 
division of McPherson's corps arrived. However, as soon as the ad- 
vance of McPherson's corps, Logan's division, arrived, I sent one bri- 
gade of the division to the left. By the judicious disposition made of 
this brigade, under the immediate supervision of McPherson and Lo- 
gan, a position was obtained giving us an advantage which drove the 
enemy from that part of the field to make no further stand south of 
Bayou Pierre, and the enemy was here repulsed with a heavy loss in 
killed, wounded, and prisoners. He was pursued toward Fort Gibson; 

* " Most 1 f 1 hem were from Logan's division, composed generally of men from the South- 
ern part of Illinois, and from Missouri. All but two of the steamers were commanded by 
volunteers from the army, and all but one so manned." — Grant's Memoirs. 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. 33 

but night closing in, and the enemy making the appearance of another 
stand, the troops slept upon their arms until daylight. Major Stol- 
brand, with a section of one of General Logan's batteries, had the 
pleasure of firing the last shot at the retreating enemy across the bridge 
on the north fork of Bayou Pierre, just at dusk on that day. 

In this battle the Union loss was 130 killed and 718 
wounded. The Union army captured 650 prisoners and 6 
field-guns. The enemy acknowledged a loss of 448 killed 
and wounded, and 384 missing. The Confederate General 
Pemberton telegraphed that night to General Joseph E. 
Johnston: 

A furious battle has been going on since daylight just below Port 
Gibson. Enemy can cross all his army from Hard Times to Bruins- 
burg. I should have large re-enforcements. Enemy's movements 
threaten Jackson, and, if successful, cut off Vicksburg and Port Hud- 
son. 

Early on the morning of the 2d, it was found that Port 
Gibson had been evacuated the previous night, and that the 
enemy had withdrawn across the two forks of Bayou Pierre 
and burned the bridges behind him. Badeau, in his " Mili- 
tary History of U. S. Grant," says: 

Grant immediately detached one brigade of Logan's division to the 
left, to engage the attention of the rebels there, while a heavy detail of 
McClernand's troops were set to work rebuilding the bridge across the 
South Fork. . . . While this was doing, two brigades of Logan's divi- 
sion forded the bayou and marched on. . . . Meanwhile another division 
(Crocker's) of McPherson's corps had been ferried across the Missis- 
sippi and . . . had come up with the command. . . . Grant 
now ordered McPherson to push across the bayou and attack the 
enemy in flank, and in full retreat through Willow Springs, demoral- 
ized and out of ammunition. McPherson started at once, and before 
night his two divisions had crossed the South Fork and marched to the 
North Fork, eight miles farther on. They found the bridge at Grind- 
stone Ford still burning, but the fire was extinguished and the bridge 
repaired in the night, the troops passing over as soon as the last plank 
was laid. This was at 5 a.m. on the 3d. Before one brigade had fin- 
ished crossing, the enemy opened on the head of the column with ar- 
3 



34 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



tillery ; but the command was at once deployed, and the rebels soon 
fell back, their movement being intended only to cover the retreating 
force. McPherson followed rapidly, driving them through Willow 
Springs, and gaining the cross-roads. Here Logan was directed to 
take the Grand Gulf road, while Crocker continued the direct pursuit. 
Skirmishing was kept up all day ; the broken country, the narrow, 
tortuous roads and impassable ravines, offering great facilities for this 
species of warfare : the enemy availed himself fully of every advantage, 
contesting the ground with great tenacity. This continued all the way 
to Hankinson's Ferry, on the Big Black River, fifteen miles from Port 
Gibson. Several hundred prisoners were taken in the pursuit. At 
four o'clock in the afternoon McPherson came up with the rebels, and 
Logan at the same time appearing on their right flank, caused them to move 
precipitously toward the river* McPherson followed hard, and arrived 
just as the last of the rebels w r as crossing, and in time to prevent the 
destruction of the bridge. It being now dark, and the enemy driven 
across the Big Black, the command was rested for the night. 

On the morning of the 3d, it was found that the previous 
night the enemy had evacuated the stronghold of Grand Gulf, 
with its elaborate and extensive works, after burying or spik- 
ing his cannon and blowing up his magazines. Thirteen heavy 
guns thus fell into the hands of the Union army. 

In a despatch to Sherman, then at Milliken's Bend, Gen- 
eral Grant wrote on the 3d : 

Logan is now on the main road from here to Jackson, and McPher- 
son, closely followed by McClernand, on the branch of the same road 
from Willow Springs. . . . The road to Vicksburg is now open. 

THE BATTLE OF RAYMOND — LOGAN'S DIVISION WINS IT "ONE 

OF THE HARDEST SMALL BATTLES OF THE WAR " THE BAT- 
TLE OF JACKSON. 

On May 12th, General Logan, leading the advance, again 
struck the enemy, under Gregg and Walker, in a clump of 
timber within two miles of Raymond, assaulted him, and after 
four hours of hard fighting drove him before the other Union 

* See also Grant's Memoirs. 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. 35 

troops could come up, with heavy loss in killed, wounded, and 
prisoners — many throwing down their arms and deserting the 
Confederate cause. General Logan's division alone partici- 
pated in this fight. Here again Logan's horse was shot under 
him while gallantly leading a bayonet charge of the Twenty- 
third Indiana. General Grant has described the battle of 
Raymond as " one of the hardest small battles of the war." * 
And in this battle Logan gained the day by his desperate and 
personal bravery. The enemy's loss in killed, wounded, and 
prisoners, was 820. On the 14th, General Logan's division 
participated in the battle of Jackson, Miss., fought outside 
the entrenched capital of the State, at which McPherson's 
corps was engaged, and assisted in routing the bulk of the 
Confederate General Johnston's command, and capturing all 
his artillery, — seventeen cannon, — the enemy losing, in killed, 
wounded, and prisoners, 845 men. Grant slept that night in 
the house which the previous night had been occupied by 
Johnston. 

LOGAN OUTFLANKS THE ENEMY AT THE BATTLE OF CHAMPION 

HILLS AND SECURES VICTORY TO THE UNION ARMS RETREAT 

AND ROUT OF THE ENEMY " THE MOST COMPLETE DEFEAT 

OF THE CONFEDERATES SINCE THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE 
WAR." 

Historians agree that the battle of Champion Hills, fought 
May 1 6th, was one of the most spirited and hotly contested 
battles of the war. Badeau thus describes the field and the 
battle : 

The enemy was strongly posted, with his left on a high wooded 
ridge called Champion Hills, over which the road to Edwards Station 
makes a sharp turn to the south as it strikes the hills. This ridge rises 

* And, in his Memoirs, Grant says : " McPherson encountered the enemy, five thousand 
strong with two batteries under General Gregg, about two miles out of Raymond. This 
was about 2 P.M. Logan was in advance with one of his brigades. He deployed and moved 
up to engage the enemy. McPherson ordered the road in rear to be cleared of wagons, and 
the balance of Logan's division, and Crocker's, which was still farther in rear, to come for- 



36 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



sixty or seventy feet above the surrounding country, and is the highest 
land for many miles round ; the topmost point is bald, and gave the 
rebels a commanding position for their artillery ; but the remainder of 
the crest, as well as a precipitous hill to the east of the road, is covered 
by a dense forest and undergrowth, and scarred with deep ravines, 
through whose entanglements troops could pass only with extreme dif- 
ficulty. To the north the timber extends a short distance down the 
hill, and then opens into cultivated fields on a gentle slope toward 
Baker's Creek, almost a mile away. The rebel line ran southward 
along the crest, its centre covering the middle road from Raymond, 
while the extreme right was on the direct or southern road. The whole 
line was about four miles long. Midway Hill, so called because midway 
betwixt Jackson and Vicksburg, — or Champion Hills, so called because 
Champion was the name of the principal land proprietor of the neigh- 
borhood, — on the rebel left, was evidently the key to the whole position. 

Continuous firing had been kept up all the morning between Hovey's 
skirmishers and the rebel advance ; and by eleven o'clock this grew into 
a battle. At this time Hovey's division was deployed to move westward, 
against the hill, the two brigades of Logan supporting him. Logan was 
formed in the open field, facing the northern side of the ridge, and only 
about four hundred yards from the enemy ; Logan's front and the main 
front of Hovey's division being nearly at right angles with each other. 
As Hovey advanced, his line conformed to the shape of the hill and be- 
came crescent-like, the concave toward the hill. McPherson now posted 
two batteries on his extreme right, and well in advance ; these poured 
a destructive enfilading fire upon the enemy, under cover of which the 
National line began to mount the hill. The enemy at once replied with 
a murderous discharge of musketry ; and the battle soon raged hotly all 
along the line, from Hovey's extreme left to the right of Logan ; but 
Hovey pushed steadily on, and drove the rebels back six hundred yards, 
till eleven guns and three hundred prisoners were captured, and the 
brow of the height was gained. The road here formed a natural forti- 
fication, which the rebels made haste to use. It was cut through the 
crest of the ridge at the steepest part, the bank on the upper side com- 
manding all below ; so that even where the National troops had appar- 

ward with all despatch. The order was obeyed with alacrity. Logan got his division in 
position for assault before Crocker could get up, and attacked with vigor, carrying the ene- 
my's position easily, sending Gregg flying from the field not to appear against our front 
again until we met at Jackson. ... I regarded Logan and Crocker as being as com- 
petent division commanders as could be found in or out of the army, and both equal to 
a much higher command." 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. ^ 

ently gained the road, the rebels stood behind this novel breastwork, 
covered from every fire, and masters still of the whole declivity. These 
were the only fortifications at Champion Hills, but they answered the 
rebels well. 

For a while, Hovey bore the whole brunt of the battle, and after a 
desperate resistance was compelled to fall back, though slowly and stub- 
bornly, losing several of the guns he had taken an hour before. But 
Grant . . . sent in a brigade of Crocker's division, which had just 
arrived. Those fresh troops gave Hovey confidence, and the height, 
that had been gained with fearful loss, was still retained. 

Meanwhile, the rebels had made a desperate attempt on their left to 
capture the battery in McPherson's corps which was doing them so 
much damage ; they were, however, promptly repelled by Smith's bri- 
gade of Logan's division, which drove them back with great slaughter, 
capturing many prisoners. Discovering now that his own left was 
nearly turned, the enemy made a determined effort to turn the left of 
Hovey, precipitating on that commander all his available force ; and, 
while Logan was carrying everything before him, the closely-pressed 
and nearly exhausted troops of Hovey were again compelled to re- 
tire. They had been fighting nearly three hours, and were fatigued, 
and out of ammunition ; but fell back doggedly, and not far. The tide 
of battle at this point seemed turning against the National forces, and 
Hovey sent back repeatedly for support. Grant, however, was momen- 
tarily expecting the advance of McClernand's four divisions, and never 
doubted the result. . . . That commander, however, did not arrive ; 
and Grant, seeing the critical condition of affairs, now directed McPher- 
son to move what troops he could, by a left flank, around to the enemy's 
right front, on the crest of the ridge. The prolongation of Logan to the 
right had left a gap between him and Hovey, and into this the two 
remaining brigades of Crocker were thrown. The movement was 
promptly executed. Boomer's brigade went at once into the fight, and 
checked the rebel advance till Holmes's brigade came up, when a dash- 
ing charge was made, and Hovey and Crocker were hotly engaged for 
forty minutes, Hovey recapturing five of the guns he had already taken 
and lost. But the enemy had massed his forces on this point, and the 
irregularity of the ground prevented the use of artillery in enfilading 
him. Though baffled and enraged, he still fought with courage and 
obstinacy, and it was apparent that the National line was in dire need 
of assistance. In fact the position was in danger. 

At this crisis Stevenson's brigade of Logan's division was moved 



33 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



forward at a double quick into a piece of wood on the extreme right of 
the command ; the brigade moved parallel with Logan's general line of 
battle, charged across the ravines, up the hill, and through an open 
field, driving the enemy from an important position, where he was 
about to establish his batteries, capturing seven guns and several hun- 
dred prisoners. The main Vicksburg road, after following the ridge in 
a southerly direction for about a mile, to the point of intersection with 
the middle Raymond road, turns almost to the west again, running 
down the hill and across the valley where Logan was now operating, in 
the rear of the enemy. Unconscious of this immense advantage, Logan 
swept directly across the road, and absolutely cut off the rebel line of 
retreat to Edwards Station without being aware of it. At this very 
juncture, Grant, finding that there was no prospect of McClernand's 
reaching the field, and that the scales were still balanced at the critical 
point, thought himself obliged, in order to still further re-enforce 
Hovey and Crocker in front, to recall Logan from the right, where he 
was overlapping and outflanking the rebel left. Had the National 
commander been acquainted with the country, he would of course have 
ordered Logan to push on in the rear of the enemy, and thus secure 
the capture or annihilation of the whole rebel army. But the entire 
region was new to the National troops, and this great opportunity un- 
known. As it was, however, the moment Logan left the road, the 
enemy, alarmed for his line of retreat, finding it indeed not only threat- 
ened, but almost gone, at once abandoned his position in front ; at this 
crisis a National battery opened from the right, pouring a well-directed 
fire, and the victorious troops of Hovey and Crocker pressing on, the 
enemy once more gave way ; the rebel line was rolled back for the third 
time, and the battle decided. 

Before the result of the final charge was known, Logan rode eagerly 
up to Grant, declaring that if one more dash could be made in front, 
he would advance in the rear, and complete the capture of the rebel 
army. Grant at once rode forward in person, and found the troops that 
had been so gallantly engaged for hours withdrawn from their most ad- 
vanced position, and refilling their cartridge-boxes. Explaining the 
position of Logan's force, he directed them to use all despatch, and 
push forward as rapidly as possible. He proceeded himself in haste to 
what had been Pemberton's line, expecting every moment to come up 
with the enemy, but found the rebels had already broken and fled from 
the field. Logan's attack had precipitated the rout, and the battle of 
Champion Hills was won. 

The rout of the rebels was complete. 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. 39 

The enemy's loss at Champion Hills was between three 
thousand and four thousand in killed and wounded, and 
nearly three thousand prisoners were captured on the field 
or in the pursuit. Logan alone captured eleven guns and 
one thousand three hundred prisoners. Some thirty cannon, 
numerous stands of colors, and large quantities of small- 
arms and ammunition were among the spoils of this victory. 
And besides routing the enemy, one of his divisions (Lor- 
ing's) was entirely cut off from Pemberton's army and never 
again rejoined it. The pursuit was kept up until night by the 
Seventeenth Corps — Logan's division reaching a point within 
three miles of Black River bridge before going into bivouac. 
The preceding extract from Badeau's work has been given 
partly because of the descriptive interest of a sanguinary vic- 
tory in which General Logan was hotly engaged, but mainly 
to show that he and his command deserve the credit of it. 
For brilliant charges and deeds of desperate daring no battle 
of the war excelled it. But it was by Logan's movement on 
the right that the battle of Champion Hills was won, and the 
enemy, with Pemberton at the head, so completely routed 
and demoralized that he hardly stopped in his retreat until 
he had reached the protecting walls of his stronghold in 
Vicksburg. It was a terribly bloody battle. When our 
troops halted along the slopes of Champion Hills, says the 
Comte de Paris in his " History of the Civil War in America," 
" the dead and wounded were piled together in such vast 
numbers, that these soldiers, although tried on many a battle- 
field, called the place ' The Hill of Death.' ' The same emi- 
nent and impartial authority says : 

The battle of Champion Hills, considering the number of troops 
engaged, could not compare with the great conflicts we have already 
mentioned, but it produced results far more important than most of those 
great hecatombs, like Shiloh, Fair Oaks, Murfreesborough, Fredericks- 
burg, and Chancellorsville, which left the two adversaries fronting each 
other, both unable to resume the fight. // was the most complete defeat 



40 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

the Confederates had sustained since the commencement of the war. They left 
on the field of battle from three to four thousand killed and wounded, 
three thousand able-bodied prisoners, and thirty pieces of artillery. 
But these figures can convey no idea of the magnitude of the check 
experienced by Pemberton, from which he could not again recover. 
. . . This battle was the crowning work of the operations conducted by 
Grant with equal audacity and skill since his landing at Bruinsburg. 
In outflanking Pemberton's left along the slopes of Champion Hills he 
had completely cut off the latter from all retreat north. Notwithstand- 
ing the very excusable error he had committed in stopping Logan's 
movement for a short time, the latter had through this manoeuvre secured vic- 
tory to the Federal army. 

General Grant, in his report of this battle, uses the fol- 
lowing language : 

Logan rode up at this time, and told me that if Hovey could make 
another dash at the enemy he could come up from where he then was and 
capture the greater part of their force, which suggestions were acted upon and 
fully realized. 

Thus, as we have seen, the enemy was driven in confu- 
sion and rout from Champion Hills and across the Big Black 
River, until he found a brief respite within his intrenchments 
around the city of Vicksburg, with the besieging lines of the 
Union army around him. 

THE SIEGE OF VICKSBURG, " THE GIBRALTAR OF THE SOUTH " 

LOGAN AT THE CENTRE — BOMBARDMENT BY LAND AND WATER 
THE TWO DESPERATE AND BLOODY ASSAULTS. 

When we consider the wonderful natural strength of that 
position — truly one of Nature's fastnesses — fortified by a 
horseshoe-like line of hills, the points of the shoe touching 
the Mississippi River above and below the city, and remem- 
ber that every available means at the command of the Con- 
federacy had been brought to bear to make it invulnerable ; 
that their most powerful cannon bristled from every hill-top ; 
that the frowning bluffs were " studded with batteries and 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. „ 

seamed with rifle-pits;" that their best soldiery manned 
their guns ; and when we remember further that the country 
immediately outside and for miles around was one vast 
swamp, heavily forested with trees, interwoven with semi- 
tropical vines and rank parasitic vegetation, not unlike the 
tropical growth along the Amazon and other South Ameri- 
can rivers, we are amazed at the result of this famous siege, 
and feel that our soldiers must have been aided by some 
supernatural power. 

" On the morning of the 18th," says the Comte de Paris, 
in his History, " Pemberton, with all his troops, shut himself 
up inside of the vast fortifications constructed around Vicks- 
burg. His forces, including the sick and a very small num- 
ber of wounded — for those of Champion Hills had all 
remained on the battlefield — amounted to thirty-three thou- 
sand men. . . . On the morning of the 19th the invest- 
ment of Vicksburg was complete. McClernand on the left, 
McPherson on the centre, and Sherman on the right sur- 
rounded the place from the Mississippi on the south, to the 
Yazoo at the north. Pemberton had abandoned all the 
outer works without a fight. . . . Grant's army, reduced 
by fighting and rapid marching, did not reach forty thousand 
men." 

Says Badeau : " The ground on which the city of Vicks- 
burg stands is supposed by some to have been originally a 
plateau, four or five miles long and about two miles wide, 
and two or three hundred feet above the Mississippi River. 
This plateau has been gradually washed away by rains and 
storms, until it is transformed into a labyrinth of sharp edges 
and deep irregular ravines. The soil is fine, and when cut 
vertically by the action of the water remains in a perpendicu- 
lar position for years ; and the smaller and newer ravines are 
often so deep that their ascent is difficult to a footman, unless 
he aids himself with his hands. The sides of the declivities 
are thickly wooded, and the bottoms of the ravines nearly 



42 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

level, except when the streams that formed them have been 
unusually large." 

"The whole line was between seven and eight miles 
long, exclusive of the four miles of rifle-trench and heavy 
batteries on the water-front. It consisted of a series of de- 
tached works, on prominent and commanding points, con- 
nected by a continuous line of trench or rifle-pit. The works 
were necessarily irregular, from the shape of the ridges on 
which they were situated, and in only one instance closed at 
the gorge. They were placed at distances of from seventy- 
five to five hundred yards from one another. The connect- 
ing rifle-pit was simple, and generally about breast-high. The 
ravines were the only ditches, except in front of the detached 
works, but no others were needed, trees being felled in front 
of the whole line, and forming in many places entanglements, 
which under fire were absolutely impassable. . . . The 
whole aspect of the rugged fastness, bristling with bayonets 
and crowned with artillery that swept the narrow defiles in 
every direction, was calculated to inspire new courage in 
those who came thronging into its recesses and behind its 
bulwarks, from their succession of disasters in the open 
field." 

It was on the morning of the 19th, as has been seen, that 
Grant's forces, in the order named, completed the investment 
of Vicksburg, forming his line across these " wooded cliffs 
and rugged chasms," and it was at 2 p.m. of that day that a 
concerted and simultaneous assault along the whole line was 
made upon the enemy's fortifications. In the meantime, the 
enemy had recovered his spirits, and met the assault with 
such spirit and energy at all points, that our troops failed to 
get a footing within his works. It enabled the Union forces, 
however, to take and hold advanced positions, unveiled the 
tremendous difficulties that opposed them, developed the en- 
emy's plan of defence, and at the expense of Federal losses 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. 43 

amounting - to four or five hundred men, demonstrated that it 
was a serious matter to storm works so well defended at all 
points. However, both moral and military reasons impelled 
General Grant to order another general assault along the 
whole line, to take place on the 226. at 10 a.m., to be sup- 
ported by the concentrated fire of all the land batteries, and 
of Porter's mortar-boats and iron-clads on the river side of 
Vicksburg. "At three o'clock on the morning of the 22d," 
says Badeau, "the cannonade began from the land side; 
every available gun was brought to bear on the works ; 
sharp-shooters at the same time began their part of the 
action, and nothing could be heard but the continued shriek- 
ing of shells, the heavy booming of cannon, and the sharp 
whiz of the minie-balls, as they sped with fatal accuracy 
toward the devoted town. Vicksburg was encircled by a 
girdle of fire ; on river and shore a line of mighty cannon 
poured destruction from their fiery throats, while the mortars 
played incessantly, and made the heavens themselves seem 
to drop down malignant meteors on the rebellious stronghold. 
The bombardment was the most terrible during the siege, 
and continued without intermission until nearly eleven o'clock, 
while the sharpshooters kept up such a rapid and galling fire 
that the rebel cannoneers could seldom rise to load their 
pieces ; the enemy was thus able to make only ineffectual re- 
plies, and the formation of the columns of attack was undis- 
turbed." At the appointed time to the minute, the assault 
was made — at the cost of three thousand Union soldiers 
killed or wounded — and failed completely, despite the hero- 
ism of all who took part in it. Says Badeau : " This assault 
was, in some respects, unparalleled in the wars of modern 
times. No attack on fortifications of such strength had ever 
been undertaken by the great European captains unless the 
assaulting party outnumbered the defenders by at least three 
to one." 



44 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

THE SIEGE-WORKS LOGAN BLOWS UP THE " MALAKOFF " OF 

VICKSBURG THE FIGHT IN THE CRATER — LOGAN'S CLOSE 

APPROACHES HE ADVISES A FINAL ASSAULT ARMISTICE 

AND SURRENDER LOGAN LEADS THE ENTRY MILITARY 

GOVERNOR OF VICKSBURG, AND RECEIVES A MEDAL. 

The assaults having failed, reinforcements were sent for, 
and the Union army, in the order previously named, sat down 
to a regular siege, the details of which would be too tedious 
for the purposes of this sketch. Suffice it to say, that General 
Logan was very conspicuous during this memorable siege, 
often inspiring his men to greater valor by exposing his own 
person to the hot fire of the enemy.* He commanded 
McPherson's centre opposite Fort Hill, the Malakoff of 
Vicksburg. It was his command that tapped and mined 
this key to the Confederate Sebastopol.f It was his com- 
mand that, after the successful explosion, stormed the gap- 
ing breach and fought the hand-to-hand fight in the bloody 
crater. So greatly did he distinguish himself, that a powerful 
battery was named after him, " Battery Logan," and Grant 
was often with him at his quarters for observation and consulta- 
tion. Here he was again wounded by a bullet in the thigh.J 
He was one of the two Generals, out of the council of thir- 

* For one stirring instance of this exposure, see Part VI. 

+ "During the siege of Vicksburg," said a man who served under McPherson, " Logan 
commanded adivision of McPherson's corps, which formed the right centre of the Union line. 
Logan's division occupied the Jackson road. The rebel line of intrenchments crossed this 
road at an elevated point, which was strongly fortified and known as Fort Hill. Here a 
mine had been run under the rebel works, whose attempts to countermine were unsuccessful. 
On the afternoon of June 25th, the mine was exploded, blowing the top of the hill com- 
pletely off and leaving a crater where it had stood. Another effect was to toss into the air 
a party of men who were at work in the rebel countermine. Some of them came down 
still alive, inside the Union lines. Among them was a negro, who was more badly scared 
than hurt. He was brought to Logan's headquarters, where somebody asked him how high 
he went. 

" 'Dunno, Massa, but I specks 'bout tree mile.' 

" This sable hero remained at headquarters until the end of the siege, and proudly 
marched into Vicksburg in the wake of Logan's division when it occupied the captured 
rebel stronghold on July 4, 1863."— Army and Navy Register, January I, 1887. 

% For Logan's own characteristic description of this incident, see Part VI. 




EXPLOSION OF CRATER AT FORT HILL, VICKSBURG.— Page 44. 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. 45 

teen, who, when the approaches at ten different points had 
reached so near to the enemy's works that the men of the two 
armies conversed across the lines, on July 1st advised Gen- 
eral Grant to again assault the enemy's works, whereupon 
Grant determined to make the final assault on July 6th. But 
in the meantime, July 3d, Pemberton proposed an armistice 
with a view to arranging terms for the capitulation of the 
great fortress. It was in front of Logan's headquarters that 
the famous interview between Pemberton and Grant was had 
at three o'clock that same afternoon, at which Logan was pres- 
ent. It was Logan's column also that, on the Fourth of July, 
1863, was the first to enter the vast conquered stronghold. 
Says the Comtede Paris, in his interesting history of this ter- 
rible and bloody siege : " Logan's division was the first to en- 
ter Vicksburg ; " and he adds : " // had fully deserved this 
honor. Grant rode at the head." Says Badeau : "Logan's 
division was one of those which had approached nearest the 
rebel works, and now was the first to enter the town. It had 
been heavily e?igaged in both assaults, and was fairly entitled 
to this honor. The Forty-fifth Illinois Infantry marched at 
the head of the column, and placed its battle-torn flag on the 
court-house of Vicksburg. Grant rode into town, with his 
staff, at the head of Logan's division." 

But no history yet written has done full justice to Logan's 
great services during this remarkable siege, the result of 
which was the surrender to the Union arms of 3 1,600 men, 
including 2,153 officers of whom 15 were generals, and 172 
cannon, — up to that time " the largest capture of men and 
material ever made in war"* — the immediate fall of Port 
Hudson, and the opening of the Mississippi from Cairo to the 
Gulf. Grant, however, recognized that to him was due the 

* See Badeau' s Military History of Ulysses S. Grant, p. 386, vol. iii. Grant, in his Mem- 
oirs, says: "Logan's division, which had approached nearest the rebel works, was the 
first to march in ; and the flag of one of the regiments of his division was soon floating over 
the court-house." 



46 LIFE OF IOGAN. 

command of the fallen city, and Logan was made its Military 
Governor. 

His valor was fitly recognized in the presentation, made 
to him by the Board of Honor of the Seventeenth Army 
Corps, of a gold medal inscribed with the names of the nine 
battles in which up to this time he had been most distin- 
guished for heroism and generalship. 

A MILITARY INTERLUDE LOGAN TAKES THE STUMP IN SUPPORT 

OF THE LINCOLN ADMINISTRATION — HE ATTACKS " THE ENEMY 

IN THE REAR " HIS ELOQUENT APPEALS TO THE PATRIOTISM 

OF THE NORTH TO STAND BY THE GOVERNMENT AND ITS 
ARMIES— THE GOOD THEY DID TO " THE CAUSE." 

Having inaugurated and perfected the administration of 
affairs at Vicksburg, General Logan, at the suggestion of his 
superiors,* took a short leave of absence for a visit to the 
North, where he frequently addressed large assemblies of his 
fellow-citizens in speeches of fiery eloquence and burning zeal 
and devotion to the cause of the Union. That year (1863) 
was one of great importance to the future of the Government 
in a civil as well as a military point of view. Mr. Lincoln 
had issued his Proclamation of Emancipation, a measure 
which the Northern sympathizers with the South were slow 
to indorse. Hence it was that it was thought desirable to 
have Logan spend a short time in the canvass prior to the 
elections of that year. He accordingly took the stump in Illi- 
nois and advocated the election of the Republican ticket and 
the carrying out of the emancipation of every slave in the 
Union. While thus engaged in fighting Copperheads in the 
rear, it was, that in his Carbondale speech of July 31, 1863, 
when accused by a set of men, who once claimed to be his 
friends, with having forgotten his party, he turned upon them 
in all the fierceness of patriotic anger, exclaiming, " I am not 
a politician to-day, and I thank God for it ! I am not like 

* President Lincoln himself requested it. 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. 



47 



those who cling to party as their only hope." In his Chi- 
cago speech of August 10, 1863, alluding to the taunt that 
he was an "Abolitionist," he said: 

If every man in this country is called an Abolitionist that is willing 
to fight for and sustain his government, let him be called so. If, be- 
longing to the United States and being true and valiant soldiers, meet- 
ing the steel of Southern revolutionists, marching to the music of this 
Union, loving the flag of our country and standing by it in its severest 
struggles — if that makes us Abolitionists, let all of us be Abolitionists. 
If it makes a man an Abolitionist to love his country, then I love my 
country, am willing to live for it and willing to die for it. If it makes a 
man an Abolitionist to love and revere that flag, then, I say, be it so. 
If it makes a man an Abolitionist to love to hear the " Star-Spangled 
Banner " sung, and be proud to hear that such words were ever penned, 
or could ever be sung upon the battle-field by our soldiers, then I am 
proud to be an Abolitionist, and I wish to high Heaven that we had a 
million more : then our rebellion would be at an end, and peace would 
again fold her gentle wings over a united people, and the old Union, 
the old friendship, again make happy the land where now the rebel flag 
flaunts dismally in the sultry Southern air. 

Alluding, in the same great speech, to Northern Copper- 
heads, he said : 

Now I want to ask you, how is it possible for any man in a country 
like this to be disloyal to his Government ? How is it possible that 
any man in this country can conceive the thought or idea of sympathiz- 
ing with rebellion against such a government as this ? . . . Where 
is the cause for it ? Where is the reason of it ; where the justification ? 
There is none to be found — not one ; and if any man becomes disloyal, 
it is because there are devilish designs and corruptions at his heart. 

My countrymen, let us look back for a few years and view the pros- 
perity and happiness that blessed all our land ; and then cast your eyes 
around and see the condition of our country now. Do not ask your- 
selves who is President, or what may be his politics ; but ask, Have we 
not hitherto had a good and beneficent government ? And if so, have 
Ave not the same government yet ? Your answer must be in the affirma- 
tive ; and, my friends, if we are but true to ourselves, true to our cause, 
true to the principles we have been educated in from our earliest in- 
fancy, we shall have that government still. 

Turn, if you please, your thoughts to the many sanguinary battles 



4 8 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

of the Revolution. See what it cost our sires to establish this govern- 
ment ! Did they not pour out their blood freely as water to accom- 
plish this, to give us this priceless heritage of national liberty and in- 
dependence, under a form of government that should exist forever ? 
Consider these sacred remembrances of those illustrious men, and then 
tell me whether it is worth preserving — tell me whether this rebellion, 
begun in infamy, perjury, and crime, carried on by blood, pillage, and 
treason, and to end, if successful, in destroying forever the last hope of 
mankind— tell me if this shall succeed ? [Cries of " No, never ! "] 

In all these facts we may realize a lesson clearly pointing out our 
duty. It is to lav fast hold of that old flag, keep step to the music of 
the Union, unfurl its ample folds, and with a heart of courage, a will 
that knows no faltering or dismay, let it flutter over every burg, and 
wave over every town and hamlet, until all traitors, like the wicked 
prince of Babylon, shall smite their knees in terror and dismay, as if 
the handwriting were upon the wall. Let them know that they must 
bow before it or kiss its untarnished folds, and swear, by all that is 
great and good, never to violate its sanctity or infringe a right it repre- 
sents, — let this be done and all will be well. And I appeal to and en- 
treat you all, my countrymen, by all that you hold sacred ; by the 
glorious memories of the past ; by the once bright hopes of the fut- 
ure ; by the memory of the gallant ones who have fallen on the gory 
fields of the South ; by the wounded and suffering who still languish 
in our midst ; by the sorrow and mourning that this wicked rebellion 
has brought upon our once happy and favored land, to be faithful, vigi- 
lant, untiring, unswerving ; determined, come what may, to dare to be 
men and do what is right. Stand by your country in all her trials, at 
every hazard, or at any cost. 

Let it not be said that those glorious boys who now sleep beneath 
the red clay of the South or the green sod of our own loved State have 
died in vain. Let those who are traducing the soldiers of the Govern- 
ment know the enormity of their crime and their error — try to reclaim 
them and bring them back to duty and to honor. If they heed not your 
appeals, if they still persist in their error and heresies, if they will not 
aid in maintaining the Government and laws that protect them, and 
continue in their wicked aid and encouragement to this rebellion— send 
them to the other side where they belong ; for the man who can live in 
this peaceful, happy, and prosperous land and not be loyal and true to 
it, ought, like Cain, to be branded by an indelible mark, and banished 
forever from his native paradise. No traitor, no sympathizer, no man 
who can lisp a word in favor of this rebellion, or impair the chances of 
the Union cause, is fit for any other ruler than Jeff Davis. He should 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. 49 

be put in front of the Union army, where he will get justice. [Ap- 
plause.] 

The man that can to-day raise his voice against the Constitution, 
the laws of the Government, with the design of injuring or in any way 
obstructing their operation, should, if I could pass sentence upon him, 
be hung fifty cubits higher than Haman, until his body blackened in 
the sun and his bones rattled in the wind. 

In bidding you good-night — I trust I do so to loyal, good, true- 
hearted citizens and patriots, who love their country — it is in the hope 
that you all may reflect upon the duties of all men to their country in 
the hour of peril, and determine with renewed zeal and fervor to o-ive 
such aid and assistance to the Government and army of the United 
States, in the prosecution of this war, as will cause that banner again 
to float in triumph upon every hill and mountain top, and in every vale, 
from the North to the South, from the East to the West. 

The cogent effect of his many eloquent and tellino- 
speeches — some of which were reported in full, and largely 
quoted from, by papers all over the country — was to cause 
many deserters, who had abandoned the army on account of 
the Proclamation of Emancipation, to return to their regi- 
ments ; despondent people took fresh courage ; faith in the 
final triumph of our arms seemed to take possession of every 
one; copperheads were dismayed and abashed ; and the re- 
turns of the November elections removed all fears of want of 
support by the people for President Lincoln's policy. 

LOGAN IN COMMAND OF THE FIFTEENTH ARMY CORPS HE 

ORDERS AS ITS CORPS-BADGE A CARTRIDGE-BOX AND " FORTY 
ROUNDS " THE ADVANCE ON ATLANTA — THE STUBBORN BAT- 
TLE of resaca — logan's victorious attack on the en- 
emy's FLANK. 

In November, 1863, General Logan succeeded General 
McPherson in the command of the Fifteenth Army Corps * 
— the corps which Grant himself, and Sherman, as well as 

* "I determined, therefore, before I started back, to have Sherman advanced to my late 
position, McPherson to Sherman's in command of the department, and Logan to the com- 
mand of McPherson's corps. These changes were all made on my recommendation and 
without hesitation." — Grant's Memoirs. 



5 o LIFE OF LOGAN. 

McPherson, had successively commanded — the corps which 
subsequently, by Logan's order, adopted as its corps-badge 
a cartridge-box, with the significant legend, " Forty Rounds" 
— and spent the ensuing winter at Huntsville, Ala., preparing 
for the campaign before Atlanta. 

Who can picture in their true colors the scenes, marches, 
trials, battles, and sufferings endured in the march to and 
during the siege of and movements around that rock-root- 
ed stronghold ? Every approach to it had been defended, 
and on its rugged mountain-walls — to scale which were like 
climbing a precipice under a torrent of leaden hail — frowned 
numberless guns. 

Early in May, 1864, General Logan, with his army corps, 
joined the advancing columns of the Grand Military Division 
of the Mississippi, which, under General Sherman, was com- 
mencing the campaign. It must be understood at the outset 
that the Army of the Tennessee under McPherson — compris- 
ing the Fifteenth, Sixteenth, and Seventeenth Corps, respec- 
tively commanded by Generals Logan, Dodge, and Blair — 
was during this entire campaign employed, in the language 
of General Sherman, as "the snapper of the whip with which 
he proposed to punish the enemy ; " and its movements to 
the right and left of the other armies, constantly reaching 
and occupying the most difficult and perilous positions, en- 
tailed upon its several commanding officers the most exhaust- 
ive, delicate, and arduous duties. 

While the main army, under the immediate supervision 
of General Sherman, was confronting the enemy at Dalton 
and Buzzard's Roost, the first flank movement of the series 
made by the Army of the Tennessee was to the right, 
through Snake Creek Gap. This attempt to break the rail- 
road to Resaca, and thus cut off the retreat of the enemy 
failed, because the place was found so completely fortified 
that it required finally the best efforts of Sherman's whole 
army to dislodge him from that position. 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. 5I 

The combined movement against Resaca was made on 
May 13, 1863, General Logan's corps leading the advance 
of the Army of the Tennessee. The scene and movement 
are thus described by an officer* of McPherson's staff: 

Logan moved first, and drew the first fire. In front of his Sec- 
ond Division was an open field, in which were the enemy's skirmishers ; 
across in the woods his line of battle. At the bugle the division fell 
into line of battle, deployed skirmishers, and swept across the field, 
driving the enemy in splendid style. General Logan accompanied the 
line. At the same time, Garrard, who had fallen back of the main 
road to allow Morgan L. Smith to move to the right, moved on the 
double-quick to the left of Osterhaus, the two divisions pushing into 
the thick wood on the left of the Second. Dodge moved his corps 
from the ferry road down through the forest to fill up the space be- 
tween the Fifteenth Corps and the Oostanaula River — his Fourth 
Division, under Veatch, having the advance. After crossing the field, 
General M. L. Smith entered the wood and pushed rapidly for the hills 
in his front ; and the whole Fifteenth Corps then suddenly moved for- 
ward, driving the enemy for a mile and a half, until the corps were in 
possession of the hills which they had been ordered to take. The re- 
mainder of the afternoon was occupied in intrenching the line, putting 
batteries in position, with skirmishers and pickets constantly exchang- 
ing shots in the meantime. 

The next day about noon General Logan received orders to make 
an assault upon the rebel lines in his front. He directed the assault 
to be made by one brigade from each of the First and Second Divisions 
— General Charles R. Wood's brigade of the First, and General Giles 
A. Smith's of the Second. The remainder of the command were placed 
in position to give such immediate support to the charging party as 
circumstances might require. General Logan was in front, busy along 
the line. It being very difficult to • cross the creek which ran between 
the attacking column and the enemy, the troops were carried to the 
opposite bank on logs, and any way they best could, under cover of a 
heavy fire from the batteries. It was six o'clock when the skirmishers 
were advanced to the foot of the hill, and commenced driving the 
enemy. At the order of General Logan, the brigade sprang up from 
the bank under which they were covered, deployed, and marched for- 
ward double-quick. Very soon, strong Confederate forces, displaying 



Colonel Clark. 



52 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



seven regimental colors, were discovered moving in column by regi- 
ments. The whole force of the two brigades of General Logan was 
deployed in front. The Confederate column would strike it in a few 
minutes. If it broke our lines the position was gone and the brigades 
lost. At this moment Logan hurried along the front. His command 
reserved its fire until the enemy was within sixty yards. Then it fired. 
The enemy's column staggered, fell back, re-formed, and renewed the 
assault. Again he was repulsed, but again re-formed and made a last 
attempt to turn Logan's flank. He was again driven back with great 
loss, and, under cover of the night, — for it was then dark, — left the 
field in possession of General Logan's troops, who advanced and placed 
the flag of the Fifty-seventh Ohio on the abandoned redoubt. At two 
o'clock in the morning the enemy had abandoned Resaca. The loss 
of the Fifteenth Corps was something over 300 men, while the enemy 
admitted casualties of over 2,500. Thus ended the first fight of any 
moment in the Atlanta campaign. 

Another and perhaps more graphic account of this fight, 
by a participant in it, is as follows : 

General Logan advanced against the main works of the enemy cov- 
ering Resaca and the bridges across the Oostanaula. The first day of 
the engagement, May 13th, Logan came up with the enemy, in consid- 
erable force, about two miles from Resaca. He steadily drove the 
enemy before him, carrying Camp Creek Hills, a strong position over- 
looking the town of Resaca, the railroad, and bridges over the river. 
The main body of the enemy fell back to a low range of fortified hills, 
about one-half mile distant, over a marshy bottom, nearly clear of 
standing timber, but full of fallen tree-trunks and thickets, and inter- 
sected with miry sloughs. The next day, May 14th, sharp skirmishing 
and heavy artillery practice were kept up from both sides. About six 
o'clock p.m. the advance was sounded, and Logan's gallant men waded 
Camp Creek with their arms and equipments held above their heads, 
and started at a double-quick over the difficult ground, followed by the 
cheers of their fellow-soldiers on the Camp Creek Hills. The rebel 
infantry poured in from the hills in front a destructive and well-directed 
fire, and the artillery from their forts opened in one continuous roar. 
But neither thicket nor slough, nor shot nor shell, diverted for a mo- 
ment the attention of the brave stormers from their objective point. 
Without slackening their speed or firing a shot, they pressed resistlessly 
forward until they planted their colors on the conquered hills. As 
this position commanded the enemy's works, the bridges over the Oos- 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. 5 , 

tanaula, a determined effort was made to retake it. Heavy columns, 
with fixed bayonets, advanced up to the very crest of the hill ; but they 
were met by a fire which swept them entirely from the front, defeated 
and disheartened. The fighting did not end until 10 p.m. General Lo- 
gan lost 102 killed, 512 wounded, and 14 missing. The enemy sustained 
a loss, in killed and wounded, estimated at 1500, and 92 taken prisoners. 
During the entire day of the 15th, skirmishing and artillery-firing was 
kept up with more or less vigor. Logan disposed his artillery so as to 
command the railroad bridge and town of Resaca, and thus hold the 
enemy entirely at his mercy. During the night of the 15th of May the 
enemy evacuated his entire line, retreating southward. Logan entered 
the town of Resaca at daylight on the morning of the 16th, pressing 
the enemy's rear-guard so closely that he did not succeed in burning 
more than one of the bridges over the Oostanaula behind him. During 
the three days and nights in front of Resaca, General Logan never left 
his men for a moment either to eat or sleep. 

This instance of Logan's untiring vigilance is but a fair 
example of his whole military career, and may be regarded 
as one of the principal reasons of his great and unvarying 
success as a military leader. 

THE BATTLE OF DALLAS LOGAn's CORPS BRILLIANTLY REPULSE 

REPEATED CHARGES OF HARDEE's VETERAN CORPS LOGANS 

GALLANT BEARING AT A CRITICAL MOMENT HE IS AGAIN 

WOUNDED. 

Still moving on the right, at Dallas, May 27th, Logan 
came up with the enemy in force, and at 4 p.m. went into 
position beyond the town, the whole rebel army confronting 
him. No time was lost in closing up his line and preparing 
for any attack that might be made, as the enemy was all the 
time endeavoring to feel his line, and not a moment passed 
without shots between the skirmishers. 

On May 28th, Hardee's corps, 23,000 strong, moved upon 
Logan's front, and then ensued one of the severest struggles 
of the campaign. Never did men fight more desperately than 
did the enemy on this occasion, to drive Logan from his posi- 
tion, as the field of battle after the contest plainly showed. 



54 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

At its close General Logan found five color-bearers dead in 
their places. In this battle Logan had no time to get up his 
artillery, and, in this most brilliant repulse of the repeated 
attacks of the enemy, relied almost entirely upon his mus- 
ketry. The report states that he was himself on that day a 
host, riding along the entire line with an electric word for 
each brave regiment, swinging his hat, and cheering - when 
the bullets rained thickest, his strong voice rising high above 
the roar of the fight. The splendid enthusiasm of the leader 
inspired the troops with a like temper, if such inspiration were 
needed, and insured their invincibility had it been for a mo- 
ment doubtful. " They are more than we," said the General, 
" but we can whip them every time — every fifteen minutes a 
day." 

One who witnessed this battle says of it : 

General Hardee's veteran corps made five or six assaults in column 
of regiments, which were bravely met by the Fifteenth Corps. Once 
the enemy broke our line and surrounded two pieces of artillery, but 
was not suffered to lay hands on the coveted guns. No soldier who 
witnessed the battle of Dallas will ever forget how grandly Logan looked, 
as with uncovered head he dashed down the line on his black war-horse, 
amid the thickest of the fight. One exultant cheer went up from the 
soldiers at this daring act of their chief, and, fired with the inspiration 
of the moment, they retook the guns and drove the enemy from the 
field. The enemy's loss must have been heavy, as over three hundred 
of his dead were left on the field. General Logan received a wound in 
the arm. 

Another, — Staff-Surgeon Duncan, — recently* said: 

At Dallas we thought he had an amulet which protected him from 
harm. During the fight at that place General Logan mounted his horse 
and rode down through a perfect shower of bullets on a Confederate 
battery. It seemed certain death. As he waved his sword in the air 
his ragged shirt showed the red one underneath. The men saw it, and 
all along the line the words ran, " Black Jack's wounded." The thought 

* After tearfully viewing the remains of his old General as they lay in state under the 
dome of the National Capitol. 






I 




LOGAN IN THE WAR. 55 

gave us strength, and with a cheer we charged, captured the battery, 
and turned certain defeat into victory. He always had that sort of in- 
fluence over his men. 

The enemy's loss was unusually heavy. Three several 
times he attacked, and was as often repulsed. Logan's loss 
was 23S, and he took 150 prisoners. 

At Dallas also occurred a night attack, which was very 
brilliant and beautiful to behold, — a streaming line of fire 
along the whole front, which, belching from musketry and 
artillery, lit up with a lurid glare the whole sky, — but accom- 
plished nothing save loss of sleep to the tired soldiers. 

The Dallas fight was the third of three successive attacks 
of the enemy since the opening of the campaign, south of 
the Etowah, up to the evening of May 28th. On the 25th, 
Hooker was engaged in the centre ; on the 27th, Wood on 
the left flank ; but the only real punishment the enemy re- 
ceived was on the 28th, from General Logan. On the 30th, 
while pointing out to Generals Sherman and McPherson the 
position of the enemy, Logan was again wounded by a shot 
through the left arm, but, with his arm in a sling, continued 
in the field. The same bullet, after hitting Logan, struck 
Colonel Taylor in the breast, disabling him. 

THE BATTLE OF BIG KENESAW MOUNTAIN THE DESPERATE 

ASSAULT UPON THE IMPREGNABLE FACE OF LITTLE KENESAW 
MOUNTAIN — WONDERFUL DISCIPLINE OF OUR BRAVE SOLDIERS 

OF THE WEST UNPARALLELED HEROISM OF LOGAN AND HIS 

MEN — ON THROUGH MARIETTA AND DECATUR TO THE FRONT 
OF ATLANTA. 

In the forward movement of our army which followed the 
battle of Dallas, and the consequent evacuation of his works 
by and the retreat of the enemy, Logan advanced on the main 
Marietta road, coming up with the enemy in full force be- 
tween Big Shanty and Kenesaw Mountain. Sharp skirmish- 
ing and artillery practice ensued, and was kept up night and 



56 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

day, almost without interruption, for three weeks, the enemy 
falling back from one line of works to another, until his line, 
in Logan's front, rested on the crest of Big Kenesaw Moun- 
tain. During this time the only engagement worthy of note 
took place on June 15th, when Logan charged against the 
enemy's right flank, driving him, amid blood and sweat and 
slaughter, from his position, killing and wounding many, and 
taking 350 prisoners, 22 of whom were commissioned officers. 
On June 26th, Logan moved out from his position and relieved 
the Fourteenth Corps in front of Little Kenesaw Mountain. 

On June 27th, the Army of the Tennessee gave the 
strongest proof exhibited during the campaign, of the thor- 
ough discipline and complete and unqualified obedience to 
orders which characterized its commanders and soldiers. Or- 
dered by General Sherman to carry the impregnable position 
of the enemy at Little Kenesaw Mountain, Logan here made 
one of the most daring, desperate, and heroic charges of the 
war. Promptly at eight o'clock in the morning, General 
Logan moved to the attack, and after an hour and a quarter 
had cleared two lines of the most obstinate abatis, carried a 
line of earthworks at a charge, followed the route of the 
enemy up his rugged stronghold through a murderous cross- 
fire of artillery and a perfect storm of bullets, conquered 
every obstacle, planted the flag at the foot of an insurmount- 
able array of cliffs, threw up defences of logs and stones, and 
held the line despite the stubborn efforts of the enemy to dis- 
lodge him.* The average perpendicular height of the preci- 
pice against which the charge was made was thirty feet. 
Along the verge of this the enemy had drawn his line of bat- 
tle, and his troops, as ours approached, hurled down rocks, 

* "I was with General Logan all through the war," said a military-looking man on the 
rear end of a Madison Street car, last evening, "and in all that time I never saw him 
shrink in battle. I used to think Hancock led a charmed life, but Logan's contempt for 
singing and screeching lead was even more pronounced than that of the great West Point 
soldier. While the battle of Kenesaw Mountain was in progress, I saw Logan ride at full 
speed in front of our lines when the bullets seemed to be falling thicker than hail. Bare- 




LOGAN AT LITTLE KENESAW MOUNTAIN -Pages 56-57. 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. ^ 

clubs, and every conceivable sort of missile that could do our 
men injury. As Logan and his brave followers attempted to 
scale the heights of this grim mountain, under the broiling 
sun, every step was like walking into the yawning pits of 
Dante's " Inferno." Line after line of his men were swept 
away by the fiery blast above them, till it seemed that all 
who dared approach must be mowed down. When he 
reached this perpendicular rocky barrier and saw his bravest 
and best bleeding and dying, and realized the utter impossi- 
bility of dislodging the enemy from his rocky fastness, the 
great tears rolled down brave Logan's face. Nearly every 
regimental commander of his storming column was either 
killed or wounded. Logan's escape untouched on this occa- 
sion was little short of miraculous. His loss in this terrible 
assault was 60 officers and 400 men killed and wounded. It 
was not, however, barren of results. During the night of 
July 3d the enemy evacuated his entire line, and Logan en- 
tered Marietta early on the morning of the 4th, capturing 
several hundred prisoners. The same day Logan moved his 
command to Nicks-jack Creek, on the right of the army, 
where the day was celebrated by an artillery fight with John- 
ston's rear-guard while that general was safely and quietly 
moving across the Chattahoochee toward Atlanta. After 
several days' skirmishing with the enemy, Logan moved to 
the extreme left, crossing the Chattahoochee, by the bridge, 
at Roswell, built by Dodge, and proceeded thence to the 
Augusta Railroad, near Stone Mountain, a distance of fifty 
miles. After effectually destroying the railroad at this point, 
Logan moved his command, by way of Decatur, to the im- 
mediate front of the enemy's stronghold, Atlanta, where, 
after a severe fight, contesting with the enemy the range of 

headed, powder-stained, and his long, black hair fluttering in the breeze, the General 
looked like a mighty conqueror of mediaeval days. He did not know what danger was. 
Standing upright in the stirrups of his saddle, I have seen him plunge to the head of a 
charging column, and bury himself in the smoke and flame of the enemy's guns." — Chicago 
Herald. 



5 8 LIFE OF IOGAN. 

hills overlooking it, he arrived and went into position July 
21st, throwing the first Union shells into that city. 

General Logan occupied on the night of the 21st an in- 
trenched position, his right being the Army of the Ohio un- 
der General Schofield, and on his left the Seventeenth Corps 
under Blair. The left flank was to have been occupied by 
General Dodge, commanding the Sixteenth Corps, who had 
been left out on the march of the preceding day by the con- 
nection of the Fifteenth and Seventeenth Corps of the Army 
of the Tennessee. The cavalry command which was cover- 
ing the flanks of the Army of the Tennessee, reporting to 
General McPherson, had been, by Sherman's orders, sent 
off to destroy a bridge near Covington, thus leaving the 
left flank "in air." The trains were stopped at Decatur, 
guarded by Sprague of Ohio with a brigade. 

The severe fighting for the position which the Army of 
the Tennessee occupied, and which it did not secure until 
dark on the 21st, led the commanding officers of that army to 
believe that the enemy was in force in their immediate front, 
and Generals Logan and Blair made disposition of their 
troops, under direction of General McPherson, accordingly. 

THE GREAT BATTLE OF ATLANTA THE DEATH OF THE GALLANT 

McPHERSON THE HEROIC LOGAN SUCCEEDS HIM — TAKING 

COMMAND OF AN ARMY FLANKED IN FRONT AND REAR, WITH 
ITS IDOLIZED COMMANDER KILLED, AND PANIC IMPENDING, 
LOGAN CONVERTS THREATENED DISASTER INTO VICTORY. 

Then came the battle of Atlanta, the bloodiest fought in 
the West, and one of the decisive battles of the war. The 
old soldiers who were there will never forget it, nor Logan, 
their triumphant chieftain — that heroic soul 

Who firmly stood where waves of blood 

Swept over square and column, 
And traced his name with bayonet-flame 

In Glory's crimson volume ! 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. 59 

On battle-field our nation's shield, 

His voice was Freedom's slogan ! 
And Victory leapt wild, for she 

Had lent her sword to Logan ! 

It was July 22, 1864. Hood had succeeded Johnston, 
and McPherson, finding himself flanked, was riding to the 
left, when he met his death. The command of the flanked 
Army of the Tennessee at once devolved on Logan. Sur- 
geon Welch, of the Fifty-third Illinois, describes what fol- 
lowed, thus : " General Logan, who then took command, 
on that famous black stallion of his, became a flame of fire 
and fury, yet keeping wondrous method in his inspired mad- 
ness. He was everywhere ; his horse covered with foam, 
and himself hatless and begrimed with dust ; perfectly com- 
prehending the position ; giving sharp orders to officers as 
he met them, and planting himself firmly in front of fleeing 
columns, with revolver in hand, threatening, in tones not to 
be mistaken, to fire into the advance did they not instantly 
halt and form in order of battle. ' He spake and it was 
done.' . . . The battle was resumed in order and with 
fury — a tempest of thunder and fire — a hail-storm of shot and 
shell. And when night closed down the battle was ended, 
and we were masters of the field. Some of the regiments 
that went into that sanguinary conflict strong came out with 
but thirty men, and another which went in in the morning 
with two hundred came out with but fifteen ! But thousands 
of the enemy bit the dust that day, and, though compelled to 
fight in front a?id rear, our arms were crowned with victory ! " 
Such, in brief, was the battle of Atlanta. But its details are 
of such consuming- interest that it demands a more extended 
description. 

Very early on the morning of the 22d, Lieutenant-Colo- 
nel Willard Warner, of General Sherman's staff, reached the 
headquarters of General McPherson and said to the latter : 
" General Sherman believes that the enemy has evacuated 



6o LIFE OF LOGAN. 

Atlanta, and desires you to move rapidly forward beyond the 
city toward East Point, leaving General Dodge of the Six- 
teenth Corps upon the railroad to destroy it effectually." 
This communication was received by McPherson with a great 
deal of surprise, and he expressed, without reserve, his 
doubts as to the correctness of General Sherman's informa- 
tion. However, the order was issued by him to General 
Loo-an to carry out the instructions received from Sherman, 
in the following words : 

Three and a half miles east of Atlanta, Ga., 
July 22, 1864. 
Major-Genera! John A. Logan, commanding Fifteenth Army Corps: 

The enemy having evacuated their works in front of our lines, the 
supposition of Major-General Sherman is that they have given up 
Atlanta and are retreating in the direction of East Point. 

You will immediately put your command in pursuit to the south and 
east of Atlanta, without entering the town. You will take a route to 
the left of that taken by the enemy, and try to cut off a portion of them 
while they are pressed in the rear and on our right by Generals Scho- 
field and Thomas. 

Major-General Sherman desires and expects a vigorous pursuit. 
Very respectfully, your obedient servant, 

(Signed) James B. McPherson, 

Major- General. 

To satisfy himself, McPherson immediately ordered his 
horse, and, with his staff, rode down to the headquarters of 
General Logan, and talked over the instructions he had al- 
ready sent him in writing. Before he reached Logan's head- 
quarters, however, there was firing exchanged between the 
pickets of our forces and the enemy. In a moment Gen- 
eral McPherson was convinced that General Sherman was 
mistaken in the supposition that the enemy had evacuated 
Atlanta. He therefore instructed General Logan, who had 
already prepared his troops for march, to go into position for 
battle, regardless of the order earlier issued, which later in- 
structions General Logan immediately commenced to carry 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. 6 1 

out, his command going into line under fire.* The order 
was also handed to General Blair, and General Dodge was 
directed to leave the railroad, and, with all despatch possible, 
take up his position on the left of the Seventeenth Corps in 
order to protect that flank, which was even then being turned 
by the enemy. So completely had the commanding general 
been misled that, in the absence of the cavalry under Garrard 
upon McPherson's flank, it became necessary for the order- 
lies and clerks at headquarters to take guns and form them- 
selves into a picket-guard to keep off the enemy's skirmishers 
until the headquarters of the Army of the Tennessee could 
be removed to a place of safety in the front. 

In the meantime McPherson had ridden over to Sher- 
man's headquarters and reported to him the disposition that 
he had made of his troops in the morning ; secured the as- 
sent of Sherman to his course, and then rode back to see 
that his own orders to Logan, Blair, and Dodge were being 
promptly and correctly carried out. The exposed position 
of the Seventeenth Corps, before referred to, had not been 
covered, when McPherson, about noon (the firing along the 
line having become general), rode out almost alone, his staff 
all being occupied in executing his previous orders. In 
passing through a narrow bridle-path, McPherson came upon 
a body of the enemy's troops — a stray company from Pat 
Claiborne's division of Hardee's corps — lying down in the 
woods, who, upon seeing him approach, rose up, the captain 
(as he afterward said) commanding him three times to halt. 
McPherson, at once supposing it to be a detachment of his 



* The Chicago Herald mentions the following incident as occurring about this time : 
'* A few moments before the good McPherson fell at Atlanta, a shell burst within twenty 
feet of General Logan. Turning to McPherson, who had been slightly stunned by the ex- 
plosion, Logan coolly remarked : 

" ' General, they seem to be popping that corn for us.' " 

"Twenty minutes later McPherson lay bleeding on the field, while Logan, who had as- 
sumed command of the troops, was hurling his battalions against the enemy with the skill 
of a born soldier." 



62 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

own troops, with his usual courteous manner lifted his hat, 
but, perceiving that- he was in the presence of the enemy, 
wheeled his horse, was fired upon, and killed. The com- 
pany was captured afterward, and the facts as here stated 
were given by its officers. 

Colonel Clark, McPherson's chief of staff, hearing the 
volley, and seeing McPherson's horse come out riderless, 
being sure that McPherson was either killed or a prisoner, 
gave orders for the recovery of his body, rode to report the 
facts to General Sherman, and was directed by him to place 
General Logan in command of the Army of the Tennessee, 
he being the ranking officer present.* 

" THE BLOODIEST BATTLE OF THE WEST " LOGAN'S PERSONAL 

PROWESS — " ONE OF THE FINEST BATTLE-PICTURES OF THE 
WAR." 

General Logan assumed command just as the engage- 
ment of that day became general, and in person gave the 
orders, and made disposition of the troops that won the 
greatest victory, in the hardest-fought battle, of the Atlanta 
campaign. In person he recovered the position lost by the 
right of his corps, and recaptured the twenty-pound Parrott 
battery of Captain De Grass. In person he directed the 
movement of the troops which repelled the seven successive 
charges of the enemy upon his line, and not until twelve o'clock 
at night, when his weary but victorious soldiers were at rest, 
did he leave his command to go and report to General Sher- 
man the successes of the day. He was received at General 
Sherman's headquarters with enthusiasm, and, for his noble 
conduct in all the critical hours of the day, complimented in 
the highest terms by General Sherman, and was assured of 

* Sherman was not on the ground during the battle of Atlanta, nor did he send to Logan 
during its progress a single order, save this, placing him in command. The battle was 
fought throughout without orders, and not as Sherman has, since Logan's death, intimated. 
See the Logan-Sherman correspondence, etc., in Part VII., Addenda, of this book. 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. 6 



o 



the permanent command of the army which he had on that 
day shown himself entitled to lead. 

General Sherman, referring- to this battle, says : " I rode 
over it (meaning- the line) the next day, and it bore the 
marks of a bloody conflict. The enemy had retired during 
that night inside of Atlanta, and we remained masters of the 
situation outside." 

On the next day, the 23d, by direction of General Logan, 
Colonel Clark, his chief of staff, received a flag of truce from 
General Hood, requesting permission to bury the enemy's 
dead. 

General Logan's summary report of the battle of Atlanta 
is in these modest words : 

Headquarters Department of Army of the Tennessee, 
before Atlanta, Ga., July 24, 1864. 

General : I have the honor to report the following summary of the 
result of the battle of the 220" inst. : Total loss in killed, wounded, and 
missing, 3,521, and 10 pieces of artillery. We have buried and de- 
livered to the enemy, under a flag of truce sent in by them, in front 
of the Seventeenth Corps, 1,000 of their killed. The number of their 
dead in front of the Fourth Division of the same corps, including those 
on the ground not now occupied by our troops, General Blair reports, 
will swell the number of their dead on his front, to 2,000. The number 
of dead buried in front of the Fifteenth Corps, up to this hour, is 360, 
and the commanding officer reports at least as many more unburied. 
The number of dead buried in front of the Sixteenth Corps is 422. 

We have over 1,000 of their wounded in our hands — a larger mim- 
ber of wounded having been carried off by them during the night, after 
the engagement. 

We captured 18 stands of colors, and have them now ; also capt- 
ured 5,000 stands of arms. 

The attack was made on our line seven times, and was seven times 
repulsed. Hood's, Hardee's, and Wheeler's commands engaged us. 
We have sent to the rear 1,000 prisoners, including 37 commissioned 
officers of high rank. We still occupy the field, and the troops are in 
fine spirits. 

Our total loss is 3,521 ; the enemy's dead thus far reported buried 
or delivered to them is 3,220 ; total prisoners sent North, 1,017 ; total 



6 4 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



prisoners wounded in our hands, 1,000 ; estimated loss of the enemy, 

over 10,000. 

Very respectfully, your obedient servant, 

John A. Logan, Major-General. 
Major-General W. T. Sherman, 

Commanding Military Division of the Mississippi. 

After describing the manner in which the lamented Gen- 
eral McPherson fell, Surgeon John M. Woodworth writes : 

Thus fell the noble McPherson, just at the first flush of the battle, 
leaving the command of the army to the no less brave and gallant Gen- 
eral Logan. By 1 p.m. the contest had become general, and the roll of 
musketry and roar of artillery continued without interruption until 
darkness closed the mad conflict. The battle throughout the day was 
most desperate, our men often fighting the enemy in front, then chang- 
ing fronts and from the reverse of their works engaging the swarming 
rebels in the rear. Time after time they charged directly up to our in- 
trenchments, where the conflict became fierce and deadly. Regimental 
commanders, with their colors, and such brave men as would follow 
them, not infrequently occupied one side of the works and our own 
men the other ; the flags of opposing regiments met on opposite sides 
of the same embankment, and were flaunted by their respective bearers 
into each other's faces ; men were bayoneted across the works, and offi- 
cers with their swords fought hand to hand with men with bayonets. 
One rebel colonel (Forty-fifth Alabama) was pulled by his coat-collar 
over the works* and made prisoner. At one time the enemy broke 
through the line of the Fifteenth Corps, which had been much weakened 
by the withdrawal of troops to re-enforce other portions of the line, and 
captured two batteries of artillery. At the moment when this occurred 
General Logan was at the extreme left ; but hearing of the disaster, he 
hastened to his old corps, and calling upon the men who had never 
failed him in the hour of danger, they soon rallied and retook the guns 
and their lost position. With the darkness terminated the battle of 
July 22d, which cost us 3,722 patriot soldiers. With men less brave, or 
a less determined and skilful leader than Logan proved himself to be, 
the unexampled record of the Army of the Tennessee had closed its 
history with a defeat but little short of annihilation. Late that night, 
while the writer was seated alone with General Logan under his tent- 
fly, recounting the incidents of the day, Logan made use of the follow- 
ing emphatic language : " I made up my mind to win the fight or never come 

* By Colonel (afterward General) William W. Belknap. 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. 



65 



out alive, for," said he, " had our army suffered defeat, the people at 
home never would realize how desperate was the struggle against such 
great odds, but would say, ' Had McPherson lived, the result would 
have been different.' " The enemy's dead were computed by General 
Logan at 3,240. 

General Sherman in his official report says : " I entertain 
no doubt that in the battle of July 2 2d the enemy sustained 
an aggregate loss of full eight thousand men." 

General Sherman also, in his report, alluding to the death 

of McPherson, said : 

General Logan succeeded him, and commanded the Army of the 
Tennessee through this desperate battle with the same success and ability 
that had characterized him in the command of the corps or a division. 

In a letter of August 16th, addressed to General Halleck, 

General Sherman also said : 

General Logan fought that battle out as required, unaided, save by 
a small brigade sent by my orders. 

General Grant also, in his official report of the battle of 
Atlanta, says : 

About 1 p.m. of this day (July 22d), the brave, accomplished, and 
noble-hearted McPherson was killed. General Logan succeeded him, and 
commanded the Army of the Tennessee through this desperate battle, 
and until he was superseded by Major-General Howard on the 27th, with the 
same success and ability that had characterized him in the command of 
a corps or division. 

Another writer, glancing at this terrible battle, says : 

Logan, fighting at one moment on one side of his works and the 
next on the other, was informed of the death, in another part of the 
field, of the beloved McPherson. Assuming the temporary command, 
Logan dashed impetuously from one end to the other of his hardly 
pressed lines, shouting " McPherson and revenge !" His emotion com- 
municated itself to the troops with the rapidity of electricity, and eight 
thousand rebel dead and wounded left upon the field at nightfall bore 
mute witness to their love for their fallen chief and the bravery of his 
successor. 

In the course of an interesting address, at Carbondale, 111., 
July 22, 1869, to the surviving members of his old Thirty- 
5 



66 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

first Illinois Regiment, General Logan himself briefly referred 
to this sanguinary battle, in the following words : 

The 2 2d day of July is the day you have selected for your annual 
meeting, and there is an appropriateness in the selection, for it is a day 
you will never forget. I well remember it, and so do you. We were in 
the heart of the enemy's country, and he, strongly intrenched. Early 
in the morning, the Fifteenth, Sixteenth, and Seventeenth Corps were 
ordered to move forward. I was in command of the Fifteenth, and you 
belonged to the Seventeenth, General Leggett's. When the advance 
was ordered, your regiment w r as put in line of battle ; and when the at- 
tack was made, a part of my own command and a part of the division 
you were in was driven back, and there McPherson fell — as brave and 
gallant a man as ever breathed a breath of life. Being the second in 
command, and the next senior officer, I took his place, and there, from 
early morn till late at night, raged the bloodiest battle in the West. 
During the day, I often passed the line commanded by General Leggett, 
and witnessed the gallant stand your regiment made. You were en- 
gaged in the very hottest of the fight, and many of your officers and 
men fell, covered with glory. And when the light of heaven began to 
fade, I rode along the shattered lines. Some regiments that went into 
the battle strong, came out with thirty men. I well remember the 
Twentieth Illinois. Two hundred men went in in the morning, and fif- 
teen stacked their arms at night. I do not remember how many of your 
regiment fell, but I do remember that it was a terrible battle. We lost 
in killed, wounded, and prisoners some four thousand gallant men, and 
the enemy over eight thousand ; but it was one of the decisive battles of 
the war, and more men were killed than in any other battle in the West 
during the whole war. You have selected that day, July 22d, which 
commemorates the battle of Atlanta, as the day for your annual reunion, 
and I think it well, for on that day your regiment suffered heavily. 

But probably the most vivid description, both of Mc- 
Pherson's death and the scenes which followed it, was that 
which fell from Logan's own impassioned lips, in his oration 
at the unveiling of the McPherson statue at Washington, 
D. C. On that occasion General Logan stated that on the 
morning of July 22, 1864, — Hood, having relieved Johnston, 
on the 19th, with a heavy force, and contested in vain the 
occupation, by McPherson, of Decatur, during the 21st, — 
McPherson received orders from Sherman to push forward 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. 6 y 

at once, as the enemy had abandoned Atlanta ; that, after 
giving orders to advance, McPherson, accompanied by. Lo- 
gan, rode to the front, found that Atlanta had not been evac- 
uated, and, countermanding the orders for the forward move- 
ment, ordered Dodge to the left, and rode to Sherman's 
headquarters to explain to him the real situation. General 
Logan continued in these words : 

While doing so, firing was heard to the left, and in the direction of 
Decatur. The enemy had turned our flank. Hastening at once to the 
left, sending his staff in every direction to bring up all the available 
forces to strengthen his lines, he, with a single orderly, rode into a blind 
path leading to General Giles A. Smith's division. Here he was met 
by a stray detachment of Pat Claiborne's command, who hailed him 
and then delivered a volley, killing him. This was a little after twelve 
o'clock. A staff officer immediately notified General Sherman of his 
death, and I was placed in command. At once General McPherson's 
staff reported to me, and aided me with the ability, promptness, and 
courage which made them so valuable in their services to him. 

Right and left, right and left, like a weaver's shuttle, went the Army 
of the Tennessee athwart the serried ways, amid heat and dust, shot 
and shell, blood and tears, weaving the crimson net-work of revenge, 
till the field was in the bloody toils and fairly won. 

The news of his death spread with lightning speed along the lines, 
sending a pang of deepest sorrow to every heart as it reached the ear ; 
but especially terrible was the effect on the Army of the Tennessee. 
It seemed as though a burning fiery dart had pierced every breast, 
tearing asunder the flood-gates of grief, but at the same time heaving 
to their very depths the fountains of revenge. The clinched hands 
seemed to sink into the weapons they held, and from the eyes gleamed 
forth flashes terrible as lightning. The cry " McPherson ! McPher- 
son ! " rose above the din of battle, and, as it rang along the line, 
swelled in power until the roll of musketry and booming of cannon 
seemed drowned by its echoes. 

McPherson again seemed to lead his troops — and, where McPherson 
leads, victory is sure. Each officer and soldier, from the succeeding 
commander to the lowest private, beheld, as it were, the form of their 
bleeding chief leading them onward to battle. " McPherson ! " and 
" Onward to victory ! " were their only thoughts ; bitter, terrible re- 



68 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

venge, their only aim. There was no such thought that day as stopping 
short of victory or death. The firm, spontaneous resolve was to win 
the day or perish with their slain leader on the bloody field. Fearfully 
was his death avenged that day. His army, maddened by his death, 
and utterly reckless of life, rushed with savage delight into the fiercest 
onslaughts, and fearlessly plunged into the very jaws of death. As 
wave after wave of Hood's daring troops dashed with terrible fury 
upon our lines, they were hurled back with a fearful shock, breaking 
their columns into fragments as the granite headland breaks into foam 
the ocean billows. Across the narrow line of works raged the fierce 
storm of battle, the hissing shot and bursting shell raining death on 
every hand. 

Over dead and dying friends and foes rushed the swaying hosts, 
the shout of rebels confident of victory only drowned by the battle- 
cry " McPherson ! " which went up from the Army of the Tennessee. 
Twelve thousand gallant men bit the dust ere the night closed in, and 
the defeated and baffled enemy, after failing in his repeated and des- 
perate assaults upon our lines, was compelled to give up the hopeless 
contest. Though compelled to fight in front and rear, victory crowned 
our arms. 

The foe, angry and sullen, moved slowly and stubbornly from the 
well-contested field, where his high hopes of victory had been so sadly 
disappointed. Following up the advantage gained, — and many minor 
contests ensued during our stay in front of Atlanta, — the Army of the 
Tennessee moved on to Jonesborough, where it met the enemy on 
August 31st, and routed him completely, effectually demoralizing his 
forces. It was then that the roar of our victorious guns, mingling with 
deafening peals, announced that the rebel general, conquered and dis- 
mayed, had blown up his magazines and evacuated Atlanta, and that 
the last stronghold of the West was ours. 

It will be observed that, on the rare occasions when Gen- 
eral Loo-an was induced to allude to or describe battle-scenes 
in which he was the hero, he barely and in the most casual 
manner alluded to himself. With the characteristic modesty 
of a chivalric nature he loved to dwell upon the services of 
his subordinate officers and the dauntless valor of his troops. 
We have heard, however, what Surgeon Welch and other 
officers have said of the inspired hero of Atlanta. Let us 
now hear the brief and graphic tribute (through another) of 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. 



69 



one of the private soldiers who fought in the ranks of the 
Union army on that gory field : 

One of Logan's "boys" then carrying a musket, but now handling 
another kind of "shooting-stick," said to the writer: "Never shall I 
forget, — never will one of us who survived that desperate fight forget, 
to our dying day, — the grand spectacle presented by Logan as he rode 
up and down in front of the line, his black eyes flashing fire, his long 
black hair streaming in the wind, bareheaded, and his service-worn 
slouch hat swinging in his bridle-hand and his sword flashing in the 
other, crying out in stentorian tones, '■Boys! McPherson and revenge!' 
Why," said he, " it made my blood run both hot and cold, and moved 
every man of us to follow to the death the brave and magnificent hero- 
ideal of a soldier who made this resistless appeal to all that is brave 
and gallant in a soldier's heart ; and this, too, when the very air was 
alive with whistling bullets and howling shell ! And if he could only 
have been painted, as he swept up and down the line on a steed as full 
of fire as his glorious rider, it would to-day be one of the finest battle- 
pictures of the war." 

Called to the temporary command, as we have seen, of 
the Army of the Tennessee, at that supremely critical mo- 
ment when, flanked and with its idolized leader slain, a panic 
had almost set in, which threatened the whole army, and dis- 
aster and utter rout impended, one would naturally suppose 
that he who, by the magic of his presence and bearing and 
almost superhuman skill and exertion and intrepidity, had not 
only saved the army but snatched victory from the very jaws 
of defeat, would have received at once the permanent com- 
mand of it. It strikes one, therefore, with a sense of injus- 
tice to learn that, after this glorious victory : 

By order of the President, General Howard assumed command. 
This was upon the recommendation of General Sherman. 

Still, Logan — who deeply felt this injustice — neither 
sulked nor murmured, but, resuming the immediate command 
of his corps, marched on, to gather other laurels.* 

* For Sherman's attempted explanations on this subject, the " Sherman-Logan corre- 
spondence," and other interesting data connected with it, see Addenda to this work. 



70 LIFE OF LOGAN. 



ANOTHER FLANK MOVEMENT OF THE ARMY OF THE TENNESSEE 
IN A PITCH-DARK NIGHT, WITH LOGAN ALL NIGHT IN THE 

saddle — logan's military skill displayed. 

The men of the Army of the Tennessee never recovered 
from a severe battle with more confidence in their leader, 
nor was the esprit de corps more manifest at any time than 
in the days succeeding the battle of Atlanta, while Logan 
remained in command. He was received everywhere among 
them with the greatest enthusiasm and with the heartiest con- 
gratulations that he was in future to be their leader. 

The time was occupied until the evening of July 26th in re- 
organizing the various commands, performing the last offices 
to the gallant dead, and preparing for the next movement, 
which was as usual by the flank, but this time to the right. 
It is but fair to say that a more difficult and delicate move- 
ment of an army than this, was not undertaken during the 
war. The enemy was intrenched closely in Logan's front, 
almost within speaking distance on many parts of the line, 
when the order came from General Sherman to withdraw 
under cover of night from that position, and move the three 
corps, past the rear of Sherman's other two armies, seven 
miles to the right. It was necessary to deceive the enemy 
entirely as to this movement, and the wheels of the gun-car- 
riages and caissons were bound with wisps of hay and straw, 
in order that the utmost silence might prevail as the Army of 
the Tennessee moved out from its position. General Logan 
was in his saddle all night long and, with his staff, person- 
ally superintended the movements of every corps. They 
moved without the slightest confusion. By daylight of the 
27th, the different corps of the entire Army of the Tennessee 
were safely upon their respective roads, prepared to go into 
their new position, and this without any casualty, leaving the 
enemy in complete ignorance of the withdrawal. The mili- 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. 



71 



tary talent displayed by Logan on this occasion was remark- 
able, when it is considered that the darkness of the ni^ht was 
such that the entire command was obliged almost to feel its 
way — it being impracticable to use any light, even that of a 
torch, with which to guide the troops. 

Howard's appointment to command the army of the 

tennessee without a word, logan returns to his 

brave corps. 

Overcome with fatigue and anxiety resulting from the 
sudden responsibility of the command of this army in the bat- 
tle of the 2 2d, and this delicate movement in the face of the 
enemy, General Logan, on the morning of the 27th, at the 
White House, where General Sherman was quartered, was 
informed that General O. O. Howard had been appointed to 
the command of the Army of the Tennessee.* Without a 
word, however, General Logan resumed command of his old 
corps, the Fifteenth, and during the 27th went into position 
on the right of the line, General Blair, of the Seventeenth 
Corps, on his left, and General Dodge, of the Sixteenth, 
upon the left flank. 

The rain poured in torrents as the army took up its posi- 
tion on that day, and it was late in the evening before the 
troops were all deployed. Again the Army of the Tennessee 
was, by its right flank, " in air." The enemy was discovered 
late in the day again upon that flank, and, as the Army of 
the Tennessee could not reach so as to secure a position 
not easily turned, General Sherman ordered General Jeff C. 
Davis, with his division, to move at once and support the 
right flank. 

* Alluding to this appointment of Sherman's, General Grant, in his Memoirs, says : " I 
doubt whether he had an officer with him who could have filled the place as Logan would 
have done." See also Addenda to this work 



72 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



THE DESPERATE BATTLE OF EZRA CHAPEL LOGAN S CORPS 

DEFEATS THE ENEMY'S ARMY, REPULSING SIX GALLANT 

CHARGES THE REBEL ARMY COMPLETELY REPULSED BY 

HIM. 

The morning of the 28th, found the Army of the Tennes- 
see again confronting the enemy. Hardly had the Fifteenth 
Corps, under Logan, thrown up their earthworks, with logs 
and rails covering in their front, when Hood came at him 
again. By eleven o'clock a.m. the fighting became general 
along his entire line, and then occurred another most desper- 
ate battle in which General Logan with his corps was exclu- 
sively engaged on our side. Six times did the enemy deploy 
from the woods in Logan's front ; six times, with words of 
encouragement and threats from their commanding officers, 
they marched up to receive the deadly fire of Logan's troops ; 
and six times they were repulsed with slaughter. Perhaps 
in the history of the war never was such persistent and des- 
perate gallantry displayed on the part of the enemy ; but 
his defeat was complete, and the reports of this battle of 
Ezra Chapel show that to Logan and his brave corps alone 
was due the credit of the victory. 

General Sherman, in his report of this battle, says : 

General Logan, on this occasion, was conspicuous as on the 2 2d, 
his corps being chiefly engaged ; but General Howard had drawn from 
the other corps, the Sixteenth and Seventeenth, certain reserves, which 
were near at hand, but not used. 

Again Sherman, speaking of Logan and his corps and 
this battle, says : 

He commanded in person, and that corps, as heretofore reported, re- 
pulsed the rebel army completely. 

General Grant, in his " Memoirs," says : 

On the 28th the enemy struck our right flank, General Logan com- 
manding, with great vigor. Logan intrenched himself hastily, and by 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. y, 

that means was enabled to resist all assaults and inflict a great deal of 
damage upon the enemy. These assaults were continued to the middle 
of the afternoon, and resumed once or twice still later in the day. The 
enemy's losses in these unsuccessful assaults were fearful. During that even- 
ing the enemy in Logan's front withdrew into the town. 

Another writer thus describes this battle of Ezra Chapel : 

The enemy had come out from Atlanta by the Burned Ferry Road, 
and formed his men in an open field behind a swell of ground, and, 
after the artillery firing I have described, advanced in parallel lines di- 
rectly against the Fifteenth Corps, expecting to catch that flank "in 
air." His advance was impulsive, but founded in an error that cost 
him sadly, for our men coolly and deliberately cut down his men, and, 
despite the efforts of the rebel officers, his ranks broke and fled. But 
they were rallied again and again, as often as six times, at the same 
point, and a few of the rebel officers and men reached our lines of rail- 
piles only to be killed or hauled over as prisoners. These assaults 
occurred from noon until about four o'clock p.m., when the enemy dis- 
appeared, leaving his dead and wounded in our hands. As many as 
642 dead were counted and buried, and still others are known to have 
been buried that were not counted by the regular detail of burial- 
parties. 

Another account of this battle written by a participant 
runs thus : 

With hardly time for the overtaxed soldiers to recover their ex- 
hausted energies, the Army of the Tennessee was moved again around 
to the right of the Union line, and on the morning of July 28th, Gen- 
eral Logan, having been relieved from the temporary command of the 
army by the appointment of General Howard, assumed command of his 
old corps, and, while moving it into position, in line of battle, on the 
extreme right of our army, just as he gained a commanding ridge upon 
which was situated " Ezra Chapel," the whole corps became suddenly 
and furiously engaged with the enemy. Our troops had not had a mo- 
ment to construct even the rudest defence, but they held their posi- 
tion, and, after about one hour of terrific fighting, the enemy retired. 
He, however, soon reformed, and again made a desperate assault, which 
was subsequently repeated four successive times, with like results. The 
temporary lulls in the fighting did not at any time exceed five minutes. 
It was an open-field fight, in which the enemy, consisting of Hardee's 
and Lee's corps, greatly exceeded us in numerical strength, but we ex- 



74 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



ceeded him in spirit and determination. The engagement lasted from 
11.30 a.m. until darkness compelled a cessation. Logan captured 5 
battle-flags, about 2,000 muskets, and 106 prisoners, not including 73 
wounded left on the field. Over 600 of the enemy's dead were buried 
in our front ; a large number were probably carried off during the 
night, as the enemy did not leave the field until near daylight. Their 
loss was not less than 5,000. Logan's only reached 562. 

Following is General Logan's official report of this obsti- 
nately fought battle : 

Headquarters Fifteenth Army Corps, 
Before Atlanta, Ga., July 29, 1864. 

Colonel : I have the honor to report that in pursuance of orders I 
moved my command in position on the right of the Seventeenth Army 
Corps, which was the extreme right of the army in the field, on the night 
and morning of the 27th and 28th inst., and during my advance to a 
more desirable position we were met by the rebel infantry from Hood's 
and Lee's corps, who made a desperate and determined attack at half- 
past eleven o'clock in the morning of the 28th. 

My lines were protected only by logs and rails hastily thrown in front 
of them. The first onset was received and checked, and the battle com- 
menced, lasting until about three o'clock in the afternoon. During that 
time six successive charges were made, which were six times gallantly 
repulsed, each time with fearful loss to the enemy. Later in the even- 
ing my lines were several times assaulted vigorously, but terminated 
with like result. The most of the fighting occurred on Generals Gar- 
rard and Smith's fronts, which formed the centre and right of the line. 
The troops could not have displayed more courage, nor greater deter- 
mination not to yield. Had they shown less, they would have been 
driven from their position. Brigadier-Generals Wood, Garrard, and 
Smith's division-commands are entitled to great credit for gallant con- 
duct and skill in repelling the assaults. My thanks are due to Major- 
Generals Blair and Dodge for sending me re-enforcements at a time 
when they were much needed. 

My losses are 50 killed, 439 wounded, and 83 missing ; aggregate, 

57 2 - 

The division of General Garrard captured five battle-flags. There 
were about fifteen hundred or two thousand muskets captured ; 106 
prisoners were captured, exclusive of 73 wounded who have been re- 
moved to hospitals and are being taken care of by our surgeons ; 565 
rebels up to this time have been buried, and about 200 supposed to be 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. ; - 

yet unburied. Large numbers were undoubtedly carried away during 
the night, as the enemy did not withdraw until nearly daylio-ht. The 
enemy's loss could not have been, in my judgment, less than six or seven 
thousand. 

I am, very respectfully, 

Your obedient servant, 

John A. Logan, 
Major-General, commanding Fifteenth Army Corps. 
Lieutenant-Colonel ' W. T. Clark, Assistant Adjutant-General. 

The indorsement upon the above report is as follows : 

Headquarters Department of the Army of the Tennessee, 
Before Atlanta, Ga., July 29, 1864. 
In forwarding the within report I wish to express my high gratifica- 
tion with the conduct of the troops engaged. I never saw better con- 
duct in battle. 

The General commanding the Fifteenth Army Corps, though ill and 
much worn out, was indefatigable, and the success of the day is as 
much attributable to him as to any one man. His officers, and in fact 
all the officers of his army that commanded my observation, co-operated 
promptly and heartily with him. 

O. O. Howard, 

Major- General. 

logan's corps still pressing the enemy on our right — 

DESTRUCTION OF THE WEST POINT RAILROAD — THE MARCH 
TO JONESBORO'. 

From July 29th, to August 26th, Logan continued to push 
forward his lines, keeping up the usual skirmish and artillery 
practice night and day, almost without interruption. On Au- 
gust 3d and nth he carried the entire intrenched skirmish- 
lines of the enemy in his front, capturing several hundred 
prisoners. In one engagement he lost sixty men, and in the 
other the killed and wounded numbered ninety-eight. 

Sherman having determined to raise the siege of Atlanta 
and take the field with his whole force, and use it against the 
communications instead of against the intrenchments of the 
city, on the night of August 26th, Logan withdrew his corps 



76 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

from its position in front of Atlanta, and, moving on the right 
of the army to the West Point Railroad, he destroyed the 
road for some distance, and, marching to Jonesboro', drove 
the enemy before him from Pond Creek, a distance of ten 
miles. 

TOUCHING INCIDENT OF THE ATLANTA CAMPAIGN THE FATHER- 
LESS BATTLE-BORN BABE, " SHELL-ANNA " THE CHRISTENING 

LOGAN IS GODFATHER. 

An affecting story of an incident which happened about 
this time is graphically told in the Washington National 
Tribune, — in which a battle-born girl-baby and General 
Logan are the central figures, — which, aside from its interest 
otherwise, exhibits the warm and tender heart that beat in 
the breast of that superb soldier. The story runs thus : 

It was the summer of 1864, and the army under Sherman had fallen 
back from its position before Atlanta and swept around to Hood's rear, 
General Logan leading the advance. I remember that the country was 
densely wooded, and that magnificent forests of pine, oak, and chest- 
nut towered on either side of the road over which we marched. We 
were not molested until we neared Flint River. There the enemy had 
planted a masked battery, and, as we approached, it enfiladed our line. 
You could scarce encounter more disagreeable travellers on a lonely 
road than shot and shell, and the boys were not long in taking to the 
shelter of the timber. But General Logan at once ordered up a field 
battery of brass "Napoleons," and presently accepted this challenge to 
an artillery duel. There was nothing to direct the fire of our gunners 
save the white puffs of smoke that could be seen rising above the foli- 
age, and the course of the enemy's shots, but they nevertheless soon 
silenced the rebel cannon, and once more cleared the way for the col- 
umn. 

We then rode forward again, the writer in company with Dr. Wood- 
ward, the medical inspector of General Logan's staff, and until his 
death, some years ago, the head of the Marine Hospital Service. Just 
as we turned a bend in the road we emerged suddenly into a small 
clearing. A rude log cabin, surrounded by evergreen shrubbery, stood 
in the clearing, and hanging from one of the bushes we noticed a yel- 
low cloth. 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. jj 

As medical officers, it naturally occurred to us at once that this was 
an improvised hospital of some sort, and we rode up to inquire. At 
the door of the cabin, as we approached, an old woman, evidently of 
the familiar " cracker " type, presented herself, but, on seeing that we 
were " Yankees," beat a hasty retreat. But we were not disposed to be 
so easily baffled, and calling her out again, began to ply her with ques- 
tions. 

She told us " there wa'n't no wounded men thar," and when asked 
why she had put out a yellow flag there, she replied: "Waal, yer see, 
my gal is sick, and I reckoned ef I put out that yer hosp't'l rag you'ns 
wouldn't be pesterin' round so much." 

"What's the matter with your child?" said I; "we are medical 
officers, and perhaps we can do something for her." 

" Waal, now," she quickly responded, "ef you'ns is real doctors, just 
look in and see what you'ns all done with your shellin'. Time my gal 
was sickest, two of yourn shells come cl'ar through my cabin, and, I tell 
you, it was right skeery for a spell." 

We accepted the old woman's invitation and walked in. It was as 
she said. The cabin, built of rough pine logs, afforded but one room, 
about twelve feet square. A small log meat-house (empty) was the 
only outbuilding, — the cow-stable having been knocked to pieces bv 
our shells, — except a small bark-thatched "lean-to" at the rear, in 
which we found a loom of the most primitive sort and constructed in 
the roughest fashion, containing a partially completed web of coarse- 
cotton " homespun." Aside from this loom, the only household articles 
visible were an old skillet, a rather dilapidated bed, two or three chairs 
without backs, and a queer collection of gourds. The shells had indeed 
played havoc with the interior. The roof had been sadly shattered, 
and a stray shot had pierced the walls. 

It had cut one of the logs entirely in two, and forcing one jagged 
end out into the room so far that it hung threateningly over the bed, 
upon which, to our astonishment, we saw lying a young girl, by whose 
side was a new-born babe with the prints of the Creator's fingers fresh 
upon it. It was a strange yet touching spectacle. Here, in this lonely 
cabin, stripped by lawless stragglers of both armies, of food and cloth- 
ing, and shattered by the flying shells of our artillery, in the storm and 
fury of the battle had been born this sweet innocent. The mother, 
we learned, was the wife of a Confederate soldier whose blood had 
stained the " sacred soil " of Virginia but a few months after his marri- 
age and conscription into the service, and the child was fatherless. 
The babe was still clad only in its own innocence, but the writer with 
his handy jack-knife cut from the unfinished web in the old loom a 



78 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

piece of coarse homespun, in which it was soon deftly swaddled. Fort- 
unately we had our hospital knapsacks with us, and our orderlies car- 
ried a little brandy, with a few medicines and a can of beef-extract, and 
we at once did all that our limited stores permitted, to relieve the wants 
of the young mother and child. 

But by this time quite a number of officers and men, attracted by 
the sight of the yellow flag and our horses waiting at the door, had 
gathered about the cabin, and, while we were inside, they amused 
themselves by listening to the old lady's account of this stirring inci- 
dent. One of the officers had given her some " store terbacker," with 
which she had filled a cob-pipe, and the fact that she was spitting 
through her teeth with such accuracy as to hit a fly at ten paces nine 
times out of ten, showed that she was enjoying herself after the true 
" cracker " style. Presently someone suggested that the baby ought 
to be christened with full military honors, and it being duly explained 
to her that to " christen " was all the same as to " baptize," she replied 
with alacrity, " Oh, yes ! baptized, I reckon, if you'ns has got any 
preacher along." 

This was all the boys wanted, and an orderly was at once sent back 
to the general commanding, with the compliments of the surgeon and 
a request that a chaplain belonging to one of the regiments in the ad- 
vance brigade might be allowed to return with the messenger to the 
cabin. 

The general asked the orderly for what purpose a chaplain was 
wanted, and the orderly replied that the doctors (mentioning our names) 
were going to have a baptism. 

Upon this, General Logan (for he it was) significantly remarked 
that the names mentioned were in themselves sufficient to satisfy him 
that some deviltry was on hand, but that, nevertheless, the chaplain 
might go. Then, inviting the colonel, who happened to be riding with 
him at the time, he set out himself for the scene, spurring " Old John " 
to a gallop, and soon had joined the party at the cabin. 

"General," said the doctor, as the former dismounted, "you are 
just the man we're after." 

" For what ? " 

" For a godfather," replied the doctor. 

" Godfather to what ?" demanded the General. 

The matter was explained to him, and as the doctor led the way into 
the house, the boys, who had gathered around the General in the ex- 
pectation that the event would furnish an occasion for a display of his 
characteristic humor, noticed there was something in Black Jack's face 
that they were not wont to see there, and that in his eyes there was a cer- 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. jg 

tain humid tenderness far different from their usual flashing- brightness. 
He stood for a moment silent, gazing at the unhappy mother and 
fatherless child, and their pitiful surroundings, and then turning to 
those about him, said tersely, 

" That looks rough." 

Then glancing around at the ruins wrought by our shells, and ad- 
dressing the men in the cabin, he called out, " I say, boys, can't you 
straighten this up a little ? Fix up that roof. There are plenty of 
4 stakes ' around that old stable — and push back that log into place, 
and help the old lady to clear out the litter, and — I don't think it would 
hurt you any to leave a part of your rations ! " 

Prompt to heed the suggestion, the boys leaned their muskets 
against the logs, and, while some of them cut brush, others swept up 
the splinters and pine-knots that the shot and shell had strewn over the 
floor, and not one of them forgot to go to the corner of the cabin and 
empty his haversack! It made a pile of commissary stores, consisting 
of meat, coffee, sugar, hard-tack, and chickens (probably foraged from 
her next-door neighbor) surpassing any that this poor " cracker" woman 
had probably ever seen or possessed at one time. 

This done, the next thing in order was the christening, and the 
chaplain now came forward to perform his sacred office. 

" What are you going to give her for a name ? I want suthin' right 
pert, now," said grandmother. 

She was told that the name should be satisfactory, and forthwith 
she brought out the baptismal bowl — which on this occasion consisted 
of a gourd — full of water fresh from the spring. 

General Logan now took the baby, wrapped in its swaddling-clothes 
of coarse homespun, and held it while the chaplain went through with 
the ceremony. The latter was brief and characterized with due solem- 
nity, the spectators behaving with becoming reverence, and thus the 
battle-born babe was christened " Shell-Anna." I like to think that as 
the chaplain's prayers were winging their way to heaven, the gory god- 
dess who nurses a gorgon at her breast stayed her red hand awhile ! 

The party now turned to leave the cabin and resume the march, 
when General Logan, taking a gold coin from his pocket, — a coin that 
he had carried as a pocket-piece for many a day, — presented it to the 
old lady as a " christening gift " for his godchild, and the officers and 
men, as they had recently drawn their pay, added one by one a "green- 
back," until the sum was swelled to an amount greater than this brave- 
hearted "cracker" had ever handled. Before parting, the General cau- 
tioned her to put the money in a safe place, lest some " — —bummer 
should steal it in spite of everything," and then, ordering a guard to 



g LIFE OF LOGAN. 

be kept over her cabin until the last straggler had passed by, he rode 
away. The old lady's good-by was, '-Waal! them thar Yanks is the 
beatenist critters I ever seen ! " 

Ten days or so after this occurrence, the cabin being by that time 
within the enemy's lines, the General, accompanied by the writer and 
ten of his escort, rode back eight miles to see how oxxx protegde was get- 
ting on, and found both mother and child, in the language of grandma, 
" quite pert." Whether General Logan's goddaughter is still alive or 
not I do not know, but five years after that visit, word reached me that 
she then was. Certainly no one who witnessed that scene will ever for- 
get the big-hearted soldier as he stood sponsor — grim, yet gentle— for 
that poor little battle-born babe of Flint River. It all came back to me, 
the other night, as I walked past the front steps of the General's Wash- 
ington house and saw a squad of little urchins climbing about his knees. 

LOGAN AGAIN BADLY WHIPS LEE's AND HARDEE'S CORPS AT 

THE BATTLE OF JONESBORO' CONSEQUENT EVACUATION OF 

ATLANTA LOGAN'S PATRIOTIC ADDRESS TO HIS GALLANT 

CORPS. 

Logan arrived in front of Jonesboro' on the evening- of 
August 30th, and, though it was past midnight before his 
troops had all crossed Flint River, yet at daylight on the 
morning of the 31st — and without the knowledge of either 
Sherman or Howard — a strong intrenched line was completed 
and his corps in position for defence. Logan, appreciating 
his situation of isolation from the main army, greatly exposed 
and liable at any moment to attack, caused his position to be 
intrenched with great care. The morning was thus spent in 
strengthening his lines and placing his artillery in the most 
commanding positions. He gave to this work, so important 
at this time, his personal supervision, and was on the ground 
when, at three o'clock in the afternoon, the enemy (Lee's and 
Hardee's corps) made a sudden and desperate assault on all 
points of his front. Every soldier of the Fifteenth Corps was 
in the trenches ready for the fray. On the enemy came, push- 
ing his lines to within thirty to fifty paces of Logan's works ; 
but the resistance he met was so well directed, that he was, 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. 8 1 

in little over an hour of hard fighting, compelled to retire, 
discomfited and in confusion. Many daring acts were per- 
formed by the enemy's officers and men. One of the gen- 
erals, (Major-General Patton Anderson) with his staff, rode 
fearlessly along his lines, doing all that a commander could 
do to make the assault a success. But four of those who 
rode with him in that perilous performance of duty returned 
from the field — himself, with many of his staff, being shot 
down. General Logan, in his official report, said of this 
general : " I could not help admiring his gallantry, though an 
enemy." * The enemy made two subsequent assaults, but 



*"Mac" in the Milwaukee Sunday Telegraph recently described a similar act of hero- 
ism on the Union side, occurring in one of these hot battles, most graphically : "In the 
midst of the tumult," says he, "we catch the sound of Union cheers, which appear to be 
far down the line where Logan's right touches the river. At first we pay little heed to 
them ; they sound much nearer, and we notice that they are not such cheers as our boys 
generally give when they are charging the foe. Neither can they be tokens of victory, for 
the din of battle is increasing, and we can still hear the yells of the charging foe. Still 
nearer and nearer come those cheers, and we now feel sure that somebody or something is 
passing along the line that pleases the troops very much, for the tone of the cheers indicates 
that it is no common occurrence. In the midst of their wild struggle with the foe, men cease 
firing for a moment, wounded blue-coats raise themselves as well as they can, and dying 
heroes turn their heads and listen wonderingly at the unusual sounds that are sweeping like 
a tornado up the line. The smoke lifting for a moment, we see our boys on the hill far 
down the line turn their backs to the rebs, who are rushing up to the muzzles of their guns, 
and, waving hats and flags, madly cheer a solitary horseman who recklessly gallops along 
the line, in full view of friend and foe. A comrade at my elbow voices the thoughts of those 

near him by asking : ' Who the d 1 is that ? ' but no one answers. On, on comes that 

fearless rider — none but a fearless rider would ride over that rough field at the speed he 
does, even though there were no shot and shell hailing around. On he comes, up hill and 
down, over fences, logs, bushes, and ditches, keeping close to the line of battle ; through 
plunging shot, bursting shell, and zipping minnies ; and, as he comes nearer we see that he 
carries his hat in hand and waves it encouragingly in answer to the cheers of the troops. 
Again the smoke of the conflict closes around him, but we know, by the shouts that follow 
him along the line, that he is still coming, and soon he bursts into view a short distance 
from us. We immediately recognize the daring rider, and shouts of ' Logan ! Logan ! 
Hurrah for Black Jack Logan ! Hurrah ! Hurrah ! ' rend the sky, and almost drown the 
roar of battle. Mounted on a powerful charger, whose hide is the color of his rider's long 
raven hair and moustache ; dressed in the full uniform of his rank ; sitting in his saddle 
with the air of a man who feels very much at home in it, the indomitable leader dashes 
through the storm of iron and lead as coolly as though he were reviewing his troops on a 
gala day, and creates a furor of enthusiasm among the men that cannot be described and is 
not easily imagined. He is on a tour of inspection along the line. He wants to see, with 
6 



g 2 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

with less spirit and determination than the first. They were 
easily repulsed, though not without terrible loss to him. The 
enemy's loss in this battle was greater than in any former en- 
gagement, except at Ezra Chapel on July 28th. Logan capt- 
ured 241 prisoners and two stands of colors. There was 
left on the field by the enemy 329 dead and 139 wounded. 
The total Confederate loss was admitted to be over 2,500. 
Owing, however, to the protection of good intrenchments, 
Logan's loss was only 154. This battle virtually decided the 
fate of Atlanta. The next day Sherman ordered the whole 
army to close down on Jonesboro', but, during the night of 
September 1st, before this order was executed, the enemy 
evacuated his position, and at day-dawn on the 2d, Logan oc- 
cupied Jonesboro'. The same night, Hood, after blowing up 
his magazines, evacuated Atlanta. 

General Sherman in his report of this battle says : 

Hearing the sounds of battle at Jonesboro' about noon, orders were 
renewed to push with the other movements on the left and centre, and 
about 4 p.m. the report arrived that General Howard had thoroughly 
repulsed the enemy at Jonesboro'. 

Thus it will be seen that Logan and his corps fought the 
battle of Jonesboro' — which led to the evacuation of the great 
stronghold of Atlanta — without the knowledge of Sherman, 
except so far as he could hear the booming of Logan's victo- 
rious guns. 

his own eyes, how goes the battle ; whether his boys are holding their own ; where the weak 
points of the line are, if any ; and to encourage the troops to stand firm and repulse the foe. 
His boys have often seen exhibitions of his reckless bravery as a soldier and his fearless 
skill as a horseman, but, as he now sweeps grandly by, there is the wildest excitement im- 
aginable. Men jump out of the trenches, throw their hats in the air, and cheer vocifer- 
ously, furiously ; the wounded swing their hats and j« >in in the chorus ; the dying make desper- 
ate efforts to see their beloved commander and to give him their last cheer ; the colors are 
dipped in salute, then wildly waved over the heads of the bearers ; there is an answering 
wave from the General's hat ; a clatter of hoofs as his noble horse, with distended nostrils 
and foaming flanks, thunders past ; and ' Black Jack,' the pride of the Fifteenth Corps, 
disappears over a hill to our left, leaving his daring ride a pleasant memory to the thou- 
sands who witnessed it, and leaving his men in the right kind of spirits to make a desper- 
ate fight." 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. 83 

The troops of the other commands of Sherman's army 
failed to come to time, otherwise the entire army of Hood 
might have been captured on August 31st (thus making it 
unnecessary to fight the subsequent battles of Franklin and 
Nashville), and, with the fall of Atlanta, the enemy's entire 
Army of the West would have been destroyed. 

The importance, however, of the capture of Atlanta, even 
without capturing the enemy's army, was sufficiently great to 
cause unbounded rejoicing in the North, and of course corre- 
sponding depression in the South. 

Among other despatches received by Sherman was the 
following from President Lincoln : 

Executive Mansion, 
Washington, D. C, September 3, 1864. 
The National thanks are tendered by the President to Major-Gen- 
eral W. T. Sherman and the gallant officers and soldiers of his com- 
mand before Atlanta, for the distinguished ability and perseverance 
displayed in the campaign of Georgia, which, under Divine favor, has 
resulted in the capture of Atlanta. The marches, battles, sieges, and 
other military operations that have signalized the campaign, must ren- 
der it famous in the annals of war, and have entitled those who have 
participated therein to the applause and thanks of the Nation. 

Abraham Lincoln, 
President of the United States. 

Another, from General Grant, was in the following 

words : 

City Point, Va., September 4, 1864. — 9 p.m. 

Major-General Sherman : 

I have just received your despatch announcing the capture of At- 
lanta. In honor of your great victory, I have ordered a salute to be 
fired with shotted guns from every battery bearing upon the enemy. 
The salute will be fired within an hour, amid great rejoicing. 

U. S. Grant, 

Lieutenant- General. 

From Jonesboro', Logan pursued the flying enemy to 
Lovejoy's, where he made another stand. Logan again had 
him in flank, and desired again to attack him and accomplish 



8 4 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



what the army had failed to do on August 31st, by reason of 
the want of co-operation of the other troops of General Sher- 
man's command ; but in the meantime Atlanta had fallen, and 
Sherman, satisfied with the glory he had achieved in its capt- 
ure, — although, as he says in his "Memoirs," "neither At- 
lanta, nor Augusta, nor Savannah, was the objective, but the 
army of Jos. Johnston (now under Hood's command), go 
where it might," — decided, as he says, "not to attempt at 
that time a further pursuit of Hood's army, but slowly and 
deliberately to move back, occupy at Atlanta, enjoy a short 
period of rest, and to think well over the next step required 
in the progress of events." Accordingly, early in Septem- 
ber, in obedience to orders, the Army of the Tennessee 
found itself in camp at East Point, Ga., and a few days later 
General Logan issued the following stirring and patriotic ad- 
dress to his victorious command : 

Headquarters Fifteenth Army Corps, 

East Point, Ga., September 11, 1864. 

Officers and Soldiers of the Fifteenth Army Corps : 

You have borne your part in the accomplishment of the object of 
this campaign — a part well and faithfully done. 

On the 1st day of May, 1864, from Huntsville, Ala., and its vicinity, 
you commenced the march. The marches and labors performed by 
you during this campaign will hardly find a parallel in the history of 
war. The proud name heretofore acquired by the Fifteenth Corps for 
soldierly bearing and daring deeds remains untarnished, — its lustre un- 
dimmed. During the campaign, you constituted the main portion of 
the flanking column of the whole army. Your first move against the 
enemy was around the right of the army at Resaca, where, by your 
gallantry, the enemy was driven from the hills and his works on the 
main road from Vilanow to Resaca. On the retreat of the enemy you 
moved on the right flank of the army by a circuitous route to Adairs- 
ville ; in the same manner from there to Kingston and Dallas, where, 
on the 28th day of May, you met the veteran corps of Hardee, and in a 
severe and bloody contest you hurled him back, killing and wounding 
over two thousand, besides capturing a large number of prisoners. 
You then moved around to the left of the army, by way of Acworth, to 
Kenesaw Mountain, where again you met the enemy, driving him from 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. 



85 



three lines of works, capturing over three hundred prisoners. Durino- 
your stay in front of Kenesaw Mountain, on the 27th of June, you made 
one of the most daring, bold, and heroic charges of the war, against the 
almost impregnable position of the enemy on Little Kenesaw. You 
were then moved, by way of Marietta, to Nickajack Creek, on the right 
of the army ; thence back to the extreme left by way of Marietta and 
Roswell, to the Augusta Railroad, near Stone Mountain, a distance of 
fifty miles, and after effectually destroying the railroad at this point, 
you moved by way of Decatur, to the immediate front of the rebel 
stronghold, Atlanta. Here, on the 22d day of July, you again per- 
formed your duty nobly, " as patriots and soldiers," in one of the most 
severe and sanguinary conflicts of the campaign. With hardly time to 
recover your almost exhausted energies, you were moved again around 
to the right of the army, only to encounter the same troops against 
whom you had so recently contended ; and the battle of the 28th of July, 
at Ezra Chapel, will long be remembered by the officers and soldiers 
of this command. On that day it was the Fifteenth Corps that, almost 
unaided and alone, for four hours contested the field against the corps 
of Hardee and Lee. You drove them discomfited from the field, caus- 
ing them to leave their dead and many of their wounded in your hands. 
The many noble and gallant deeds performed by you on that day will 
be remembered among the proudest acts of our nation's history. After 
pressing the enemy closely for several days, you again moved to the 
right of the army, to the West Point Railroad, near Fairburn. After 
completely destroying the road for some distance, you marched to 
Jonesboro', driving the enemy before you from Pond Creek, a dis- 
tance of ten miles. At this point you again met the enemy, composed of 
Lee's and Hardee's Corps, on the 31st of August, and punished him se- 
verely, driving him in confusion from the field, with his dead and many 
wounded and prisoners left in your hands. Here again by your skill 
and true courage you kept sacred the reputation you have so long main- 
tained, viz. : " The Fifteenth Corps never meets the enemy but to strike 
and defeat them." On the 1st of September the Fourteenth Corps at- 
tacked Hardee ; you at once opened fire on him, and by your co-opera- 
tion his defeat became a rout. Hood, hearing the news, blew up his am- 
munition trains, retreated, and Atlanta was ours. 

You have marched during the campaign, in your windings, the dis- 
tance of four hundred miles, have put hors du combat more of the enemy 
than your corps numbers, have captured twelve stands of colors, 2,450 
prisoners, and 210 deserters. 

The course of your march is marked by the graves of patriotic 
heroes who have fallen by your side ; but at the same time it is more 



86 LIFE OF IOGAN. 

plainly marked by the blood of traitors who have defied the Constitu- 
tion and laws, and insulted and trampled under foot the glorious flag 
of our country. 

We deeply sympathize with the friends of those of our comrades in 
arms who have fallen ; our sorrows are only appeased by the knowl- 
edge that they fell as brave men, battling for the preservation and per- 
petuation of one of the best governments of earth. " Peace be to their 
ashes." 

You now rest for a short time from your labors. During the res- 
pite, prepare for future action. Let your country see at all times by 
your conduct that you love the cause you have espoused ; that you 
have no sympathy with any who would by word or deed assist vile trait- 
ors in dismembering our mighty Republic or trailing in the dust the 
emblem of our national greatness and glory. You are the defenders of 
a government that has blessed you heretofore with peace, happiness, 
and prosperity. Its perpetuity depends upon your heroism, faithful- 
ness, and devotion. 

When the time shall come to go forward again, let us go with the 
determination to save our nation from threatened wreck and hopeless 
ruin, not forgetting the appeal from widows and orphans, that is borne 
to us upon every breeze, to avenge the loss of their loved ones who 
have fallen in defence of their country. Be patient, obedient, and 
earnest ; and the day is not far distant when you can return to your 
homes with the proud consolation that you have assisted in causing the 
old banner to again wave from every mountain's top and over every 
town and hamlet of our once happy land, and hear the shouts of tri- 
umph ascend from a grateful people, proclaiming that once more we 
have one flag and one country. 

John A. Logan, 
Major- General, commanding. 

ANOTHER INTERLUDE LOGAN ON THE " STUMP " AGAIN, DE- 
FENDING THE PARTY OF THE UNION. 

After the termination of the Atlanta campaign, — in which 
he had borne so gallant and conspicuous a part, — Logan, 
again upon the suggestion of his superiors,* took another 
leave of absence, and went North to stump the Western 
States during the Presidential campaign of 1864. The same 

* President Lincoln especially desiring it ; the War Department, also. 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. 8y 

influence which, as we have seen, rallied the Democrats of 
Egypt to the flag of their country, upon the first call to arms, 
was again brought to bear upon them to support and vote 
for the Republican ticket. Logan worked in this cause like 
a giant, and, with his rare eloquence of speech and manner, 
and his personal magnetism, succeeded in winning them 
over ; they hailed him again as their political leader, and fol- 
lowed his guidance ; but he persistently declined all offices 
tendered to him, declaring as he did so that he was a soldier 
and would not leave the service nor lay down his sword so 
lono- as there remained one rebel in arms against the Govern- 
ment. Alluding to what General Logan did at this time, the 
New Era (Illinois) subsequently said : 

During the campaign in '64, he came home and battled for Mr. Lin- 
coln and the Republican party, and certainly contributed as much to 
the success of the party in this State and Indiana as any other man. 
While he was doing this— fighting rebels in the field, and their friends 
at home, — many men who have always been supported by the party 
were lukewarm in the cause of the country and the party. General 
Logan took bold and decided grounds at once, and advocated using 
any and all means to put down the rebellion and sustain Mr. Lincoln's 
administration, while many others, now prominent in the Republican 
ranks, were grumbling and complaining at many things done to suppress 
opposition to the Government. 

LOGAN PERFORMS AN ACT OF RARE MAGNANIMITY HE GIVES 

GLORIOUS OLD " PAP " THOMAS HIS CHANCE, AT NASHVILLE 

LOGAN ACCORDINGLY REJOINS HIS OLD FIFTEENTH CORPS 

AT SAVANNAH. 

General Logan's labors for the Government, in the politi- 
cal arena, prevented his return to his command before com- 
munications with Atlanta were severed. At the conclusion 
of the political campaign, however, he was called to City 
Point, Va., General Grant's headquarters,* and ordered to 

* " At last I had to say to General Thomas that I should be obliged to remove him un- 
less he acted promptly. He replied that he was very sorry, but he would move as soon as 



88 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

proceed to Nashville to assume command of the Army of the 
Cumberland, then under General Thomas. With the order 
of supersedure in his pocket, he reached Louisville, Ky., and 
there learning that General Thomas had attacked the enemy 
in front of Nashville, and believing in that general's ability to 
conduct the engagement to a successful issue, not only kept 
the document in his pocket without presenting it to Thomas, 
but immediately telegraphed to General Grant, suggesting 
that Thomas should not be removed in the face of the ene- 
my, but that on the contrary he deserved the highest honors 
a grateful nation could bestow, and asked at the same time 
to be reassigned to his old command, the Fifteenth Corps. 
Such an example of magnanimity as this is almost unparalleled 
in military annals. This act of self-abnegation, while tempt- 
ing laurels lay at his feet ready to be plucked, is perhaps one 
of the grandest acts of heroism in all Logan's heroic life. He 
had conquered others often enough by eloquence, by logical 
force, by patriotic example, as well as by the sword, but here 
he conquered self. 

Logan's request was complied with, and he rejoined his 
old command, then at Savannah, Ga. 

the campaign of the carolinas its relative impor- 
tance much greater than "the march to the sea " 

the part logan's corps contributed to it. 

In January, 1865, the long, perilous, and toilsome winter 
campaign of the Carolinas was commenced. The obstacles 

he could. General Logan happening to visit City Point about that time, and knowing him 
to be a prompt, gallant, and efficient officer, I gave him an order to proceed to Nashville to 
relieve Thomas. I directed him, however, not to deliver the order or publish it until he 
reached there, and if Thomas had moved, then not to deliver it at all, but communicate 
with me by telegraph. I went as far as Washington City, when a despatch was received 
from General Thomas announcing his readiness at last to move, and designating the time 
of his movement. I concluded to wait until that time. He did move, and was successful 
from the start. This was on December 15th. General Logan was at Louisville at the 
time this movement was made, and telegraphed the fact to Washington, and proceeded no 
farther himself.'' — Grant's Memoirs, vol. ii., pp. 3S2-3S4. 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. 89 

encountered and overcome, the trials and privations endured 
in struggling through the succession of swamps and mo- 
rasses, continually confronted and harassed by the enemy, 
beggars description. General Sherman well says, in compar- 
ison with the " March to the Sea " through Georgia, the 
movements of his armies through the Carolinas, to encounter 
Johnston's Army of the Potomac, were in importance, — not to 
speak also of all that pertains to hardships, deprivations, and 
intense and continuous labor, — as ten to one. The march of 
Napoleon across the Alps, with his Army of Italy, would not 
compare with the greater difficulties encountered by the 
Army of the West during the winter and spring of 1864-65, 
in the Carolinas campaign. The troops started with twenty 
days' rations — short at that. The supply was soon disposed 
of, and the army for ninety days subsisted upon the enemy's 
country. There were times of sharp hunger and famine, and 
times of great abundance. Strong men frequently cried with 
hunger, and then again made merry over their captured sup- 
plies. All the streams and the almost interminable swamps, 
from Savannah to Raleigh, had to be crossed on loes or 
floats, in the face of a watchful enemy ; but our persistent 
skirmishers would find their way to the opposite shores and 
turn the flanks of the enemy ; our advance, — wading through 
the swamps with the water up to their waists, frequently to 
their armpits, their cartridge-boxes strapped to their necks, 
and their muskets held above their heads, — silencing the 
enemy's opposing batteries. 

THE TERRIBLE SUFFERINGS AND DIFFICULTIES OF THE MARCH 

ADVANCING AND FIGHTING WITH WATER UP TO THE MIDDLE 

LOGAN WORKING WITH HIS MEN, NIGHT AND DAY, IN THE 

SWAMPS VARIOUS ENGAGEMENTS. 

While each corps of the army encountered almost insur- 
mountable obstacles in its pathway, the Fifteenth Corps at 
one time found itself, during the march, in Lynch Creek Bot- 



90 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

torn, — or " Lynch Creek without any bottom," as the soldiers 
called it, — where it was impossible to employ mules or horses 
to drag the artillery trains over the swamp. It therefore 
became necessary to unhitch the animals and lead them 
through on the high ground, while the troops were compelled 
with ropes to pull the trains across the flooding torrents of 
water which, with the velocity of a mill-race, were rushing 
through the woods. While other general officers were lux- 
uriating in comfortable headquarters, General Logan was 
with his men all night long amidst the storm of rain, wading 
from command to command, encouraging them by his pres- 
ence, and exhibiting the same qualities of patience, endurance, 
and heroism which characterized him when leading his com- 
mand in the midst of battle. It was on this occasion that it 
was impossible for the men to make fire for their coffee, and 
for twenty-four hours they were compelled to appease their 
hunger by eating the raw corn from the cob ; but they were 
encouraged and were enthusiastic because their General was 
with them — nor did he leave them until the work was ac- 
complished, and the trains pulled through, on to dry land. 

During this terrible campaign, Logan was ever on the 
alert. Breakfasting by the light of the camp-fire ; through- 
out the day at the point of greatest danger, encouraging and 
inspiring confidence in his soldiers ; and though it were 
nightfall and often midnight before he sat down to his sim- 
ple dinner of corn-bread and bacon, — -with only a small tent- 
fly awaiting him as a covering for the night, — he never was 
heard to complain, nor did he seem to think of his own dis- 
comfort, so intent was he on accomplishing the object of the 
campaign, and securing, as far as possible, the comfort of the 
soldiers under his command. And it was this very sim- 
plicity, self-abnegation, and incessant watchfulness for their 
well-being in all respects, that, together with his genius for 
war, personal intrepidity and energy in action, made Logan 
almost an object of worship among his men. 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. 9I 



FORCING THE PASSAGE OF THE LITTLE SALKAHATCHIE AND 

CONGAREE — CHARGING THROUGH MUD AND WATER THE 

SURRENDER OF COLUMBIA THE CITY IN FLAMES LOGAN'S 

MEN STAY THE DEVOURING ELEMENT. 

On February 5th, Logan's corps was forcing the passage 
of the Little Salkahatchie River, charging, through mud and 
water, in the face of the enemy's fire, and driving him from 
his line of works. Advancing on the line of the railroad, the 
8th was spent in tearing up the railroad tracks, piling rails 
on ties and setting fire to them, and twisting every rail so 
that it could not again be used by the enemy. On the 12th, 
Logan was crossing the North Edisto, — skirmishing heavily 
in front and successfully flanking the enemy with other troops 
of the command, — in which action the enemy lost three killed, 
an unknown number of wounded, eighty prisoners, and two 
hundred stand of arms ; Logan's loss being only one killed 
and five wounded. Continuing the movement on Columbia, 
on the 15th it was found necessary to force the passage of 
Congaree Creek, and at the same time make a demonstration 
on the Great Congaree. It was the dismounted cavalry com- 
mand of General Wade Hampton that undertook to contest 
Logan's crossing of the Congaree Creek. Logan soon turned 
the enemy's position, which was hastily abandoned as our 
troops gallantly charged over his lines, and, in the face of a 
hot artillery fire, put out the flames of the burning bridge, 
which the enemy endeavored to burn behind him. That 
night, all night long, the enemy shelled Logan's camp. On 
the next day the enemy having shown no disposition to sur- 
render the city of Columbia, a section of DeGrass' battery, 
from Logan's command, shelled it. On the 17th, after cross- 
ing the Saluda and Broad Rivers, the surrender of the city of 
Columbia was made, and the city occupied by Colonel Stone's 
brigade. That night Columbia was in flames. How the fire 



9 2 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



originated was never known. Sherman, in his " Memoirs," 



*& 



says : 

Many of the people thought that this fire was deliberately planned 
and executed. This is not true. It was accidental, and, in my judg- 
ment began with the cotton which General Hampton's men had set fire 
to on leaving the city (whether by his orders or not is not material), 
which fire was partially subdued early in the day by our men ; but, 
when night came, the high wind fanned it again into full blaze, carried 
it against the frame-houses, which caught like tinder> and soon spread 
beyond our control. 

The brigade already in Columbia being insufficient to 
fight the conflagration and to restore order in the panic- 
stricken city, Logan ordered in fresh troops, and to their ex- 
ertions is due the preservation of such portion of the city as 
escaped the fire. Toward morning, order was fully restored. 
The 1 8th and 19th were spent by Logan's command in de- 
stroying the public stores found in Columbia, and in destroy- 
ing the railroad running northward ; also in organizing the 
trains of persons, negro and white, who desired to go North 
— those trains which subsequently grew to such great pro- 
portions. 

PASSAGE OF LYNCH'S CREEK BOTTOM AND BLACK CREEK LO- 

GAN'S MEN, " UP TO THEIR ARMPITS IN WATER," DRIVE THE 

ENEMY THE TERRIBLE QUICKSANDS AND SWAMPS BETWEEN 

LUMBER RIVER AND LITTLE ROCK FISH CREEK. 

On February 26th Logan's corps commenced the pas- 
sage of Lynch's Creek Bottom — to whose difficulties and 
dangers allusion has already been made — the skirmishers, up 
to their armpits in water, driving the enemy's cavalry. Black 
Creek was passed under circumstances nearly as bad. The 
last of the wagons were, however, clear early in March. On 
March 5th and 6th the Great Pedee was crossed. All this 
while, of course, all the resources of the country through 
which the Union armies marched were put under contribu- 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. n - 

tion. The movement of Logan's corps on Fayetteville com- 
menced March 7th. There had been heavy rains day and 
night, making the roads almost impassable, and the swamps 
and creeks, despite all the difficulties of doing so, had to be 
corduroyed. In fact the succession of swamps, between 
Lumber River and Little Rock Fish Creek, can scarcely be 
described. Amid the most violent rains the whole corps on 
the 9th worked day and night, as pioneers, until the treach- 
erous country was passed. It was a perfect quicksand. 
Thus, for some ten days, the troops of Logan's command 
were necessarily subjected to the severest trials of a soldier's 
life. On the 10th, better ground was reached. On the 14th, 
the accompanying trains of refugees were sent off to Wil- 
mington. 

CROSSING THE CAPE CLEAR AND SOUTH RIVERS THE BATTLE 

OF BENTONVILLE OR MILL CREEK SUCCESSIVE CHARGES 

UPON THE ENEMY, DRIVING HIM INTO HIS WORKS THE EN- 
EMY EVACUATES AND RETREATS. 

On the 15th, Logan's corps crossed Cape Clear River. 
On the 17th, it crossed South River, although the bottom of 
that stream had "fallen out," and the worst holes had to be 
filled in with bricks and huge logs, pinned down to keep 
them in position. On the 19th, Logan drove the enemy's cav- 
alry across the Neuse River, near Goldsborough. On the 
20th, he drove the enemy along the Bentonville Road across 
Cox's Bridge. Logan was now seeking to establish com- 
munication with the left winsf of the Union forces, which was 
engaging the enemy under Johnston, and was marching to 
its support by the sound of the guns. On approaching Mill 
Creek, Logan expected to meet the enemy in force. He was 
confronted by the enemy's dismounted cavalry, who took 
position, as the Union troops advanced, behind successive 
barricaded points, from which Logan's men handsomely and 
successively drove him back. The last outwork defended 



94 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



by the enemy, before retreating within his main line, having 
been carried, Logan held the cross-roads to Bentonville and 
Smithneld, and intrenched opposite the main line of the 
enemy. At four o'clock that afternoon Logan advanced, 
drove the enemy, and went into an advanced line, which he 
firmly intrenched. There was skirmishing all that night. 
The right and left wings had now effected a junction in front 
of the V-shaped lines of Johnston's army. On the 21st 
Logan advanced on the enemy in gallant style, driving him 
into his works and developing most completely his entire line 
in our front. The advanced position was intrenched, and 
during that day and night Logan's batteries played on the 
enemy's works. During the night the enemy evacuated his 
entire line of works and retreated across Hannah Creek, 
burning the bridge behind him, to Smithfield. Logan then 
moved with his corps from his works on Mill Creek to Golds- 
boro', March 23d, and went into camp around that place — 
the object of the campaign having been accomplished. 

TWO STRIKING INCIDENTS OF LOGAN'S HUMANITY AND JUSTICE. 

Here, while his command is resting for a few days, it may 
be well to mention two striking incidents of General Logan's 
humanity and sense of justice and honesty which took place 
during" the march through the South, after Atlanta, and are 
told by Governor Carpenter of Iowa (in the Inter- Ocean of 
May 5, 1874), Carpenter at that time being on Logan's staff. 
Said he, in speaking of that march : 

A certain Democratic General gave orders to the chief of his trans- 
portation that he should take up his pontoons as soon as his division or 
corps had crossed the rivers with their own impedimenta, and not allow 
" the niggers " to follow. Rebel cavalry hung upon the rear of the ad- 
vancing army, and it became the finest possible sport for them to go 
" a-coloneling through those unarmed and helpless camp-followers, 
sabring them down on all sides without mercy, and turning back into 
servitude those whose lives they chose to spare. General Logan's 
course was slightly different, lie ordered the officers in charge of his 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. 95 

pontoons not to remove them until the last " contraband " was safely 
across and under the protection of the army. 

Another fact Governor Carpenter stated in regard to his 
old commander : 

The army unfortunately contained a set of officers who were always 
anxious to jay-hawk almost anything in the way of property when they 
were in the " enemy's country." On one occasion several of these thrifty 
gentlemen made a descent upon a locality where there was a quantity 
of fine blooded horses, and they each brought one away with the inten- 
tion of appropriating them to their own use. One morning there was 
a great commotion among these officers, and a free use of the idiom of 
Flanders, consequent upon an order from " headquarters " to the effect 
that these horses should be turned over to the quartermasters. A strong 
remonstrance was made, but the General informed them that the horses 
were now Government property, and, if used by private individuals, 
must be bought and paid for. These acts indicate the innate love of 
justice which has characterized this brave soldier throughout his whole 
career. 



FALL OF RICHMOND AND PETERSBURG LOGAN ADVANCES ON 

SMITHFIELD — JOHNSTON'S ARMY EVACUATES IT THE ADVANCE 

ON RALEIGH JOHNSTON SURRENDERS, AND THE WAR IS 

ENDED LOGAN ORGANIZES THE " SOCIETY OF THE ARMY OF 

THE TENNESSEE." 

On April ioth, Richmond and Petersburg having surren- 
dered to General Grant, Logan's corps advanced on the right 
for Smithfield — which Johnston had, however, hastily evacu- 
ated — and Raleigh. Thus, his command had led the ad- , 
vance of the Army of the Tennessee, driving the enemy at 
every point until, passing through Columbia, Fayetteville, 
and Goldsboro', it reached Raleigh, near which point the sur- 
render of Johnston's army took place, thus bringing the cam- 
paign to a triumphant close. 

It will be understood that, in thus following Logan's corps 
and narrating its operations, it is not intended to detract in 
the slightest degree from the credit due to other corps of the 



9 6 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



army, which had overcome similar obstacles and engaged in 
similar fighting over the roads that they marched. 

No very serious engagement of Logan's corps worthy of 
special note had occurred during the march, save that of 
Benton's Cross Roads, or Mill Creek, and yet the casualties 
had reached an ao-orecfate of about five hundred. 

While negotiations for the surrender of Johnston's army 
were in progress, General Logan conceived the idea of form- 
ing a Society of the Army of the Tennessee, with the object 
of keeping alive and perpetuating the kindly and cordial feel- 
ing which had characterized the relations of the officers and 
men of that army during its long career of victorious service. 
At the meeting for organization, held in the Capitol building 
at Raleigh, N. C, Logan was urgently solicited to accept the 
presidency of the society, but declined the honor, and urged 
the selection of General Rawlins, then chief of General Grant's 
staff; claiming that while the choice of the latter must give 
satisfaction to every officer of the army, it would at the same 
time compliment General Grant — the first commander of the 
Army of the Tennessee. 

A THRILLING INSTANCE OF LOGAN'S PERSONAL HEROISM ALONE 

AND UNAIDED HE SAVES THE PEOPLE OF RALEIGH FROM MUR- 
DER, ARSON, AND " WORSE THAN DEATH." 

Under the heading " A Noble Deed Raleigh Should 
Not Forget," the Raleigh, N. C, State Jour7ial recently 
said : 

The Greensboro' North State reminds us of the following incident, 
the recollection of which should be kept green in the memory of every 
citizen of Raleigh who can remember the spring of 1865 : 

" When the news of Lincoln's assassination reached Raleigh in 
April, 1865, there was a fearful panic. Sherman's entire army, consist- 
ing of about 160,000 troops all told, were encamped in and around the 
city. Terror prevailed among the people, and the greatest excitement 
anions: the troops. Threats of the most awful kind were freely indulged 
in. The night after the assassination a body of stragglers from the en- 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. gj 

campment near the city marched toward the town with lighted fagots, 
threatening its destruction. A messenger came hurrying into the city 
with the news. One brave earnest man was found to stay the angry 
passions of the Federal soldiery. He mounted his horse and galloped 
at full speed to meet the coming crowd. He drew his sword from its 
sheath and, raising himself in his saddle, he threatened with instant 
death the first man who dared to injure an innocent and unprotected 
people. The crowd gave way before his flashing and defiant eye, and 
Raleigh was saved from murder and arson, and its defenseless females 
from worse than death. That man was John A. Logan of Illinois." 

LOGAN AGAIN IN COMMAND OF THE ARMY OF THE TENNESSEE 

THE MARCH NORTHWARD, TO WASHINGTON THE GRAND 

REVIEW AT THE NATIONAL CAPITAL HE MUSTERS OUT HIS 

60,000 SOLDIERS AT LOUISVILLE, AND TENDERS HIS RESIG- 
NATION AN AFFECTING FAREWELL TO HIS ARMY. 

After the capitulation of Johnston, Logan marched his 
command northward, through Fredericksburg and Alexan- 
dria, to Washington. On May 12th, General Howard having 
been ordered to take charge of the Freedmen's Bureau, Gen- 
eral Logan, amidst the greatest enthusiasm of his old com- 
rades-at-arms, assumed once more the command of the Army 
of the Tennessee, comprising 60,000 veterans. At the head 
of this vast array of patriotic soldiers, crowned with the laurels 
of many victorious campaigns, Logan, on May 24th, having 
entered Washington, took prominent part in the grand review 
before the President of the United States of the Federal forces 
— the most imposing military spectacle ever witnessed upon 
the American continent. 

Subsequently General Logan was ordered with his army 
from Washington to Louisville, Ky. ; and, after mustering out 
his troops to the last man, he returned to his home and his 
family in Illinois. 

Having no further duty to perform, and unwilling to re- 
ceive pay without service, — unlike many others, — he resigned 
his commission, again became a private citizen, and resumed 
the practice of his profession as a lawyer. 

7 



9 8 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

The military record of this brilliant and peerless volunteer 
soldier fitly closed with the following affecting 

.FAREWELL ADDRESS TO THE ARMY OF THE TENNESSEE: 
Headquarters Army of the Tennessee, 
Louisville, Ky., July 13, 1865. 
Officers and Soldiers of the Army of the Temicssce : 

The profound gratification I feel in being authorized to release you 
from the onerous obligations of the camp, and return you, laden with 
laurels, to homes where warm hearts wait to welcome you, is somewhat 
embittered by the painful reflection that I am sundering the ties which 
trials made true, time made tender, suffering made sacred, perils made 
proud, heroism made honorable, and fame made forever fearless of the 
future. It is no common occasion that demands the disbandment of a 
military organization, before the resistless power of which, mountains 
bristling with bayonets have bowed, cities have surrendered, and mill- 
ions of brave men have been conquered. Although I have been but a 
short period your commander, we are not strangers ; affections have 
sprung up, between us — during the long years of doubt, gloom, and 
carnage which we have passed through together, nurtured by common 
perils, sufferings, and sacrifices, and riveted by the memories of gallant 
comrades whose bones repose beneath the sod of a hundred battle- 
fields — which neither time nor distance will weaken or efface. The 
many marches you have made, the dangers you have despised, the 
haughtiness you have humbled, the duties you have discharged, the 
glory you have gained, the destiny you have discovered for the coun- 
try in whose cause you have conquered, all recur at this moment, in all 
the vividness that marked the scenes through which we have just 
passed. From the pens of the ablest historians of the land, daily, are 
drifting out upon the current of time, page upon page, volume upon 
volume, of your heroic deeds, which, floating down to future genera- 
tions, will inspire the student of history with admiration, the patriot 
American with veneration for his ancestors, and the lover of Republican 
liberty with gratitude to those who in a fresh baptism of blood recon- 
secrated the powers and energies of the Republic to the cause of con- 
stitutional freedom. Long may it be the happy fortune of each and 
every one of you to live in the full fruition of the boundless blessings 
you have secured to the human race ! 

Only he whose heart has been thrilled with admiration for your im- 
petuous and unyielding valor in the thickest of the fight can appreciate 
with what pride he recounts the brilliant achievements which immor- 
talize you, and enrich the pages of our national history. 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. 



99 



Passing by the earlier but not less signal triumphs of the war, in 
which most of you participated and inscribed upon your banners such 
victories as Donelson and Shiloh, I recur to campaigns, sieges, and 
victories that challenge the admiration of the world, and elicit the un- 
willing applause of all Europe. Turning your backs upon the blood- 
bathed heights of Vicksburg, you launched into a region swarming with 
enemies, fighting your way and marching without adequate supplies, 
to answer the cry for succor that came to you from the noble but be- 
leaguered army of Chattanooga. Your steel next flashed among the 
mountains of Tennessee, and your weary limbs found rest before the 
embattled heights of Missionary Ridge, and there with dauntless cour- 
age you breasted again the enemy's destructive fire, and shared with 
your comrades of the Army of the Cumberland the glories of a victory 
than which no soldier can boast a prouder. 

In that unexampled campaign of vigilant and vigorous warfare 
from Chattanooga to Atlanta, you freshened your laurels at Resaca, 
grappling with the enemy behind his works, hurling him back dismayed 
and broken. Pursuing him from thence, marking your path by the 
graves of fallen comrades, you again triumphed over superior numbers 
at Dallas, fighting your way from there to Kenesaw Mountain ; and 
under the murderous artillery that frowned from its rugged heights, 
with a tenacity and constancy that finds few parallels, you labored, 
fought, and suffered through the broiling rays of a southern midsum- 
mer sun, until at last you planted your colors upon its topmost heights. 
Again on the 2 2d July, 1864, rendered memorable through all time for 
the terrible struggle you so heroically maintained under discouraging 
disasters, and that saddest of all reflections, the loss of that exemplary 
soldier and popular leader, the lamented McPherson, your matchless 
courage turned defeat into a glorious victory. Ezra Chapel and Jones- 
boro' added new lustre to a radiant record, the latter unbarring to you 
the proud Gate City of the South. The daring of a desperate foe, in 
thrusting his legions northward, exposed the country in your front, 
and though rivers, swamps, and enemies opposed, you boldly sur- 
mounted every obstacle, beat down all opposition, and marched onward 
to the sea. Without any act to dim the brightness of your historic 
page, the world rang plaudits when your labors and struggles culmin- 
ated at Savannah, and the old " Starry Banner" waved once more over 
the walls of one of our proudest cities of the seaboard. Scarce a 
breathing spell had passed, when your colors faded from the coast, and 
your columns plunged into the swamps of the Carolinas. The suffer- 
ings you endured, the labors you performed, and the successes you 
achieved in those morasses, deemed impassable, form a creditable epi- 



IOO LIFE OF IOGAN. 

sode in the history of the war. Pocataligo, Salkahatchie, Edisto, 
Branchville, Orangeburgh, Columbia, Bentonville, Charleston, and 
Raleigh are names that will ever be suggestive of the resistless sweep 
of your columns through the territory that cradled and nurtured, and 
from whence was sent forth on its mission of crime, misery, and blood, 
the disturbing and disorganizing spirit of secession and rebellion. 

The work, for which you pledged your brave hearts and brawny 
arms to the government of your fathers, you have nobly performed. 
You are seen in the past, gathering through the gloom that enveloped 
the land, rallying as the guardians of man's proudest heritage, forget- 
ting the thread unwoven in the loom, quitting the anvil, and abandon- 
ing the workshops, to vindicate the supremacy of the laws and the au- 
thority of the Constitution. Four years have you struggled in the 
bloodiest and most destructive war that ever drenched the earth with 
human gore ; step by step you have borne our standard, until to-day, 
over every fortress and arsenal that rebellion wrenched from us, and 
over city, town, and hamlet, from the Lakes to the Gulf, and from 
ocean to ocean, proudly floats the " Starry emblem " of our national 
unity and strength. 

Your rewards, my comrades, are the welcoming plaudits of a grate- 
ful people, the consciousness that, in saving the Republic, you have 
won for your country renewed respect and power at home and abroad ; 
that, in the unexampled era of growth and prosperity that dawns with 
peace, there attaches mightier wealth of pride and glory than ever be- 
fore to that loved boast, " I am an American citizen ! " 

In relinquishing the implements of war for those of peace, let your 
conduct, which was that of warriors in time of war, be that of peaceful 
citizens in time of peace. Let not the lustre of that brighter name 
that you have won as soldiers, be dimmed by any improper acts as citi- 
zens, but as time rolls on let your record grow brighter and brighter 
still. John A. Logan, 

Major- General. 

A BRIEF RESUME OF GENERAL LOGAN'S MILITARY CAREER A 

TRIBUTE TO THE AMERICAN VOLUNTEER SOLDIER LOGAN 

THE HIGHEST EMBODIMENT OF THE SOLDIER WHO NEVER 
FORGOT THAT HE WAS A CITIZEN. 

The military career of General Logan has thus been 
traced by the records, and other historical sources, from the 
battle of Belmont, through all the campaigns of the Army of 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. IOI 

the Tennessee, down to the disbandment of that army in 
1865. We have seen that no officer entered the Union army 
under greater opposing pressure ; that none was compelled, 
as was he, to find the ashes cold, where the fires burned 
bright of yore, upon a thousand hearthstones ; that none 
made such sacrifices in all that was near and dear to him ; 
that none was more obedient to orders, nor exhibited greater 
alacrity, efficiency, and valor in executing them ; that none 
submitted to greater disappointment, or indignity, without a 
murmur ; that no man who wore the uniform, ever exhibited 
more self-denial, earnest patriotism, or abiding faith in the 
ultimate triumph of the Union cause ; nor was there a man 
in the army more courageous, persistent, and determined in 
his course than General Logan, from the beginning to the 
end. 

Sherman has, in his " Memoirs" intimated* that General 
Logan was a " political general." If to be a " political gen- 
eral " is to comprehend at a glance the position of the Amer- 
ican citizen and his duty when the life of the nation is at 
stake ; if it is to sunder almost every tie, save that of wife 
and child, which binds him to his kindred, and for the sake 
of country sacrifice everything, save these, that is dear to 
him on earth ; if it be the giving up of every hope of political 
preferment, the flinging away at once of every ambition save 
that of being a hero fighting for his country's cause ; if it be 
to accept without a murmur the lowest place and to rise only 
by his personal prowess and military merit and skill to the 
command of an entire army ; if it be to hear his voice in 
the darkest hours of the rebellion not only above the din of 
bloody battle and amid the hurtling missiles at the front, but 
also upon the rostrum attacking " the enemy in the rear " 
with equal force and eloquence and boldness, and with the 
same success with which he waves his sword when storming 

* See correspondence between Sherman and Logan, and other matter bearing upon the 
point, in the Addenda at the end of this work. 



102 LIFE OF IOGAN. 

the enemy's line in the field ; if it be to carve out his own 
military career as he did his political career — combining the 
leadership of the masses at the hustings with that leadership 
in the field which was crowned with the very " inspiration of 
victory ; " if it be to modestly and quietly retire at the end of 
the war to his old field of labor in his own State with the 
gallant men whom he had so often led to triumphs, and who 
so often afterward gave him their votes with the same hearti- 
ness as they had given him their cheers upon the field of 
battle ; if it be to reach a lofty niche in the temple of fame 
both as warrior and statesman — if this is the meaning of 
" political general," then it is only a sad pity we could not 
have had all our generals of a like pattern. 

The history of the great War of the Rebellion will never 
be fully written until its central figure is made the citizen-sol- 
dier — the American volunteer. The mouth-piece, the expres- 
sion, of the volunteer, is his general, with whom he must be 
in perfect sympathy, and whose ambition should always be to 
protect his subordinates, of whatever grade, in all that prop- 
erly belongs to them as soldiers. One officer of the regular 
service has most gracefully placed the American soldier in his 
true position before the country. Says General Pope : 

It is true now, as it always will be true in a free country and among 
a free people, that in time of war the self-denying patriot and true hero 
is found in the ranks ; a nameless man, with no hope nor wish for per- 
sonal preferment, with no purpose except to serve his country, he leaves 
behind him no legacy of heart-burnings, nor disputes, nor controversies, 
to vex his descendants. He lives in the affectionate remembrance of 
thousands of his countrymen who never heard his name, and whose only 
knowledge of his history is the touching record of his devoted service 
or his patriotic death. 

Such was the volunteer private soldier of our Civil War, 
and such will he always be when our country calls its citizens 
to arms. And it may as truly be said, as has already been 
hinted, that our volunteer soldiers, thus organized, thus in- 
fluenced, thus self-denying and self-sacrificing, always select 



LOGAN IN THE WAR. 



103 



for their leader one who most nearly embodies their idea of a 
patriot and hero ; and their enthusiasm on the battle-field, the 
eagerness with which they follow him, the implicit confidence 
they place in him, are nothing more nor less than their recogni- 
tion of themselves in the man whom they have chosen to com- 
mand them. It is but the truth to say that it was because Gen- 
eral Logan was recognized by them as the highest embodiment 
of the American volunteer-soldier — who never forgot that he 
was one of the people, and always had a mutual sympathy with 
and for them in all their patriotic impulses and wishes — that 
the old veterans of the war, the men who made it a success, 
the men who preserved the Nation at the risk of their lives 
and at the cost of their blood, stood by him everywhere to 
the hour of his death, and " swore by him " as they did when 
he led them on the sterner fields of war to certain victories. 

In concluding this sketch of General Logan's military ca- 
reer, it may be proper to state that he was the only officer of 
the war, whether volunteer or regular, commanding an army 
of more than two corps, who led it to victory in every engage- 
ment in which he was in command ; and further, that he was 
the only volunteer officer of the Union armies who succes- 
sively held command of a regiment, a brigade, a division, a 
corps, and an army, who was never defeated while leading 
them. 



PART III. 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 

HIS PERSONAL APPEARANCE, AND SOME OF HIS CHARAC- 
TERISTICS. 

" To few, but wondrous few, the powers belong 
To merit lasting praise and epic song ; 
Who nobly earns, in council and debate, 
The grateful homage of his Sovereign State ; 
Who acts the statesman's and the hero's part — 
A man of wisdom and of lion heart ; 
And pleads and fights to save his country's cause, 
And crowns his triumphs with impartial laws — 
That chief, of raven locks and eagle eye, 
Is Logan ! Names like his shall never die ! " 

The personal appearance of General Logan was com- 
manding - . He was of medium height, with a very robust 
physical development, a broad and deep chest, massive body, 
and small hands and feet. His features were handsome and 
regular, his complexion swarthy, his hair and heavy mus- 
tache long and jet black, while his piercing black eyes shone 
with a peculiar light when aroused to anger, or danced with 
humor and pleasure whenever such emotions bestirred him. 

One who had known him long and intimately, summed up 
his character, while Logan was yet alive, in these words : 
" He has a large and comprehensive mind stored with liberal 
views. He has a heart open to acts of the rarest generosity 
and kindness. He is a warm friend and a forgiving enemy, 
only implacable when basely wronged. He likes a good 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 105 

cigar, but otherwise is rigidly temperate. Inured from his 
earliest youth to severest hardships, he never shrinks from 
a duty that involves effort or fatigue. He works chiefly at 
night, and when most men are asleep in their beds Logan is 
busy at his desk. When a student, he accustomed himself to 
think and compose while walking the floor ; hence his ease 
and ready command of language on the platform. He is one 
of the few men, if not the only man, in Congress, who never 
"corrects" his speeches. His voice is strong, yet musical 
and sympathetic, and his utterances rapid, yet distinct. One 
of his peculiar characteristics is the wonderful influence he 
exercises over men by his personal magnetism. This is most 
marked on the field of battle, and in his speeches when fully 
aroused, and is largely due not alone to his absolute sincerity, 
but to the ability he possesses to control and concentrate the 
whole nerve-power of his brain upon a single object." But 
we must hasten to glance briefly at Logan's career as a pub- 
lic man, after the war. 

LOGAN THE STATESMAN THE COOPER UNION MEETING HE 

FRUSTRATES THE ATTEMPT OF THE DEMOCRATIC LEADERS TO 
CAPTURE OUR UNION GENERALS. 

Shortly after the close of the war an attempt was made 
by certain influential men of New York City, in the interest 
of the Democratic Party, to capture the great Union Generals 
of the war. It was supposed that, with a little finesse, Grant 
and Logan especially, who, before the war broke out, were 
Democrats, could easily be trapped back into the Democratic 
Party, and that the other leaders of our armies and navies 
would follow them, and thus give that party some chance for 
reinstatement in power, and rehabilitate it with the control of 
the Government. They knew, what the people then did not 
know, that Andrew Johnson, elected Vice-President on the 
Republican platform, and who had succeeded to the Presi- 



IQ 6 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

dency on the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, was still at 
heart a Democrat, despite his grandiloquent utterances against 
treason to the Government and against traitors. Under the 
guise, then, of a grand Union meeting to support the admin- 
istration of President Johnson and to welcome the victorious 
generals of the war, they got up a monster assemblage at the 
Cooper Institute Building in that city, on June 7, 1865, at 
which Grant and Logan and Blair were present by special 
invitation. Of course it was a very grand and flattering ova- 
tion that they thus received, to which Grant responded only 
by bowing. Logan being called on to speak, shifted the 
honor to Blair's shoulders. Blair fell into the trap, and unre- 
servedly indorsed the President's programme. Then the 
people clamored to hear Logan, and Logan made them a 
thoughtful and eloquent speech, in which he foreshadowed 
the difficulties of reconstruction, and said : 

The great questions that have been before the people for the last 
four years are now settled ; the rebellion is suppressed ; slavery is for- 
ever dead ; the power of this great Government has been felt and is 
well understood, not only at home, but abroad ; the supremacy of the 
laws of the country, with its Constitution, has been maintained by the 
prowess of Americans ; the people of America have satisfied themselves 
—for there was once some doubt of it— that they can maintain the laws 
and the Constitution of the land, suppress rebellion, and cause all men 
to bow in humble submission to the Constitution and the laws. 

But he also said, and his words opened the eyes of many 
to the snare that had been laid for them : 

My friend General Blair suggested an idea to me on this subject 
[the object of the meeting], that this meeting was called for the pur- 
pose of approving the administration of President Johnson. [" Yes," 
" Yes " and cheers.] So far as his administration has developed itself, I cer- 
tainly have no fault to find with it. ["Good," " Good."] What there 
may be to object to in the future I don't know ; but if there is anything objec- 
tionable, then, as a matter of course, as the questions arise the country will have 
a right to decide for itself whether the President is in the right or in the 
wrong. 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 107 

SUGGESTS THE PRESENTATION OF THE ALABAMA CLAIMS, THE 
RETIREMENT OF MAXIMILIAN, AND THE HONEST PAYMENT OF 
OUR NATIONAL DEBT. 

In that speech, he suggested, among other things, that a 
bill should be presented to the British Government for a 
settlement of the Alabama claims ; that Maximilian should be 
invited to leave Mexico ; and he eloquently protested against 
the doctrine of repudiation of the National debt, which was 
then being agitated. Said he : 

Let us then, when our country is restored, when the Union once 
again is seen rising before us in all its majesty and beauty — let us look 
upon it with pride, and remember with gratitude that in the hour of 
trial we found a strong arm — the arm of the people — ready to strike in 
its defence, to take it from the grasp of the foul traitors who were 
clutching at its vitals, and to guard and preserve it forever. And as we 
thus look gratefully and proudly back upon our deliverance, let us at 
the same time lay our hands upon our hearts and say, " Our nation has 
not only maintained itself, it not only dazzles the world with its majesty 
and power, but at the same time it can boast that its record is spotless ; 
that it has not only shown itself willing to fight in war for success, and 
ready to demand of other nations that which is proper and right and 
just ; but at the same time, in order that it may live on always as 
proudly and grandly as it has lived in the past, it shall act as an honest 
man does toward his neighbor — it shall pay its citizens, and everybody, 
every dollar and every cent that it justly owes. [Great cheering] 
By doing this, by taking this course, we can always be proud of the 
name of Americans, and other nations will point to us and say, "That 
country has a record that no citizen living upon her soil need be 
ashamed of in any court in the world." 

logan's great speech at louisville, ky. — on slavery, 
emancipation, and education the war and its re- 
sults he beards the lion in its den. 

The next public speech General Logan made was in July, 
1865, at the court-house of Louisville, Ky. It was a remark- 
able speech, in which he boldly stood up before the slave- 
holders of Kentucky, — who had even refused to be paid for 



io 8 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

the proposed emancipation of their slaves when President 
Lincoln made the offer, — and not only pleaded with them to 
adopt the then pending Thirteenth Constitutional Amend- 
ment, but to liberate their slaves voluntarily and without pay- 
ment, and proved to them that it was in the interest of their 
own material prosperity so to do. It was a brave speech, a 
persuasive speech, an eloquent speech. In it he gave the 
following terse yet comprehensive review of the rebellion and 
its results : 

The revolution we have just passed through has shaken from centre 
to circumference the civilized world. The war we have just fought 
through, is without a parallel in the annals of ages. It has developed 
resources of power that have smitten mankind with mingled admiration 
and amazement. Superficial observers attribute its origin to a fanatical 
design to abolish slavery, and claim that this is the one only great re- 
sult that has been accomplished. It had no such origin. The truth is, 
it was the bastard bantling of ambition and avarice. Demagogues, as- 
piring to rise, poured into the ear of credulous cupidity the poison of 
passion. Capital is proverbially timid. Man is easily persuaded that 
his estate is in danger. Sectional prejudices were exasperated. Public 
distrust and private discontent, hand in hand, went stalking abroad at 
noonday over the land. " The Southern heart " was fired—" fired with 
unmanly fear and unholy lusts." The Southern mind was " instructed," 
wickedly instructed, in all the subtle sinfulness of treason. The rest is 
history. 

Among the results accomplished, it is true that the abolition of slav- 
ery claims a high rank, but not the highest. The political problem 
embraced in the proposition asserting man's capacity for self-govern- 
ment was at stake. It involved freedom's fairest fortunes, civil liberty's 
last lingering hope. If man is not able to govern himself, he must 
wear the chains of slavery that tyrants forge for his limbs, and can 
never be free ; and if the Government of the United States had failed 
to sustain itself in this very first ordeal through which its stability was 
called to pass, the glorious orb of civil freedom must have gone down 
forever in gloom and blood. Propagandism would have received a 
blow that would have sent it staggering along its winding way for 
another thousand years over Europe. Legitimacy would have taken a 
lease for her crowns to her thrones for the same period, and man must 
have been left to sleep another long, dark night of slavery and despair. 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 109 

This Government was fast attaining an altitude of national pros- 
perity that was filling all Europe with alarm. That prosperity was 
(and still is, thank Heaven) threatening to swallow up the wealth of 
the world ; our growing power held every crown on earth in awe. To 
have exploded the fundamental principles of philosophy upon which 
such a government was erected would have been indeed a great tri- 
umph for them. But the God of battles has ordered it otherwise. The 
rebellion has been crushed, the Union has been preserved, and our 
Government stands to-day on a foundation of public faith against which 
neither the treachery of treason nor the gates of hell can ever prevail. 
That great political problem " still lives," and the " Stars and Stripes " 
still wave, and God grant that they shall ever wave, " o'er the land of 
the free and the home of the brave," until 

" Wrapt in red flames the realms of ether glow, 

And Heaven's last thunders shake the world below." 

Upon the subject of slavery, — and he illustrated his posi- 
tion by an array of facts and figures that was absolutely con- 
clusive, — in the very teeth of the slaveholders he was ad- 
dressing, he was not afraid to say : 

The institution of slavery was always a curse to the country where 
it existed. . . . This peculiar institution prevents public prosperity, 
by multiplying monopolies, discouraging the dissemination of knowl- 
edge, fostering indolence and ignorance, degrading the humble, crip- 
pling industry, pandering to the pomp of the proud, and crushing 
under the iron heel of social despotism the aspirations of plebeian ambi- 
tion. It fills the land with nabobs who must have baronial estates in 
acres by the thousands to lord it over. The owner of twenty thousand 
acres of land rarely ever cultivates more than one thousand. Here, 
then, are nineteen thousand acres of land lying idle, which, if owned 
by two hundred industrious freemen who would cultivate it, might be 
made to support a population of one thousand people, besides contrib- 
uting liberally to the public revenue. But owned, as these large estates 
have been in the South, by men who would neither cultivate nor rent 
them out, that whole country has been, as it were, under the lock and 
key of an aristocratic proprietorship which amounted to an insuperable 
bar to immigration, effectually preventing the increase— at least any- 
thing like a rapid increase— of the white population, and naturally 
stunting the material growth of the State. 

Already, Logan the private citizen, had been devoting 
the few weeks that had elapsed since the close of the war to 



IIO LIFE OF LOGAN. 

a close study not alone of the causes which had produced 
that fearful convulsion, and the immediate results flowing 
from the triumph of the Union arms, but to other and more 
remote results, and also the instrumentalities by which might 
be restored to the whole land a far greater measure of pros- 
perity, happiness, and progress than it had ever yet seen. 
He had already reached certain definite conclusions on this 
subject at a time when the public mind, even of the North, 
was hesitant and befogged. Hence, at this early day, and in 
the very presence of slaveholders, he said of the attitude of 
the Nation to the negro race : 

According to the views I entertain of the obligations the Govern- 
ment has incurred toward this benighted race, it has no right to leave 
them where they now stand. We found them slaves, and made them 
freemen ; we found them in a state of barbarous ignorance, living re- 
gardless of all law, human or divine, in open and notorious concubinage, 
and is it not our solemn duty as Christians to enlighten them, to dip 
them at least seven times in the Jordan of civilization ? This duty, if 
recognized, implies the necessity of universal emancipation in all sections at 
the same time, that the legislation on this subject may be general and in- 
discriminate, thorough and universal. 

Hence, also, at this early day, he had reached the conclu- 
sion that popular education must of all things be encouraged, 
that illiteracy must be wiped away — an idea which we shall 
see he afterward endeavored, with all his power, to urge upon 
Congress ; an idea that has since developed into the propo- 
sition to distribute the present large surplus in our National 
treasury to the various States for educational purposes, the 
distribution to be made on the percentage of necessity, the 
basis of illiteracy. More than twenty years ago, armed with 
all the logic and righteous eloquence of his cause, Logan told 
Southern men to their faces, on their own soil, these things : 

We look in vain through the Southern States for public schools. 
Ignorance sits enthroned where the flowers bloom in mid-winter and 
waste their fragrance upon the desert air. Why is this ? The riddle 
is easily read. The educated man will think, and if his heart is edu- 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. IXI 

cated will feel, and "out of the abundance of the heart the mouth 
speaketh." Surely, then, that same policy which made it a legal crime 
to educate a slave must, in the inexorable spirit of its theory, oppose 
the education of any and every body who, per possibility, may become 
the friend of the slave. The people of the South having resolved to 
perpetually persist in holding on to their institutions, pursued a politic 
plan to prevent the spread of popular education. Can any man fail to 
see, or fail to feel, that any institution, the interest of which must make 
such exactions, is bound to be a country's curse ? Lycurgus, who was 
a great and good Grecian lawgiver in his day and generation, insisted 
that children are the property of the State. There is but one use to 
which the State can put children — that is, to educate them. Intelligence 
is Heaven's rarest gift to earth. It is that attribute which gives men a 
claim to an affinity with angels ; and that State is false to her most 
sacred trusts, as well as to her most vital interests, which fails to de- 
velop all of her mental resources. Had a wise system of popular edu- 
cation been adopted at the South at the same time it was in the North, 
that section might not be to-day, as it verily is, without the light of 
a single great mind to guide it through the dark wilderness of its 
troubles. Attribute, if you please, the degradation, in which is found 
buried the Southern mind, either to a jealousy of education or the self- 
ishness of affluence, and still it is the institution of slavery that causes 
it. Slaveholders constituted invariably a large majority of their legis- 
lative bodies. Having the means to educate their own children, they 
failed to feel for others, and were unwilling to vote for a measure ap- 
propriating the people's money to the education of the poorer classes 
of society, and the consequence is that in the rural regions of the South 
the people are frequently found in whole communities totally destitute 
of the simplest rudiments of an English education. That allusion of 
President Johnson to the fact that not only had the negro, but also the 
poor white man of the South, been made free, was pregnant with a 
stunning significance. God grant that the schoolmaster may soon find 
his way to that unhappy land. It is a wilderness of desolation now, but 
it is a wilderness that, under careful culture, a provident patriotism may 
cause to blossom as the rose. The smile of Heaven has fallen nowhere 
more softly and sweetly than it has fallen there. It rests upon her 
mountain-brows like a crown of glory ; the eye lingers rapturously upon 
the landscape where Nature's pencil has left its most delicate touches 
and tints. In mid-winter, over her variegated fields of wild-flowers, an 
air floats "soft and balmy as the perfumed atmosphere of an Auzonian 
heaven." In the transparent bosom of her quiet lakes, millions upon 
millions of the finny tribe disport, while along their shady shores, the air 



II2 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

is often darkened by the wings of canvas-back duck and other aquatic 
fowls, whose flesh is prized by epicureans as a dainty delicacy. Fruits, 
rich in the voluptuous juices that delight the thirsty palate, are indig- 
genous to the soil, and it is there that you will find the throne of the 
vegetable kingdom. In her hill-sides are found every variety of mineral 
ore, while it seems to have been the design of Jehovah that her soil and 
clime should produce the cotton and the rice that is to glut the marts of 
the world. Her rivers are broad, and navigable enough to furnish com- 
mercial highways, while thousands of her smaller streams tempt enter- 
prise to speculate in the utilizing of their spendthrift waters. From her 
mountain-sides gush mineral fountains whose medicinal fame arrests the 
attention and attracts the weary footsteps of affliction's wandering pil- 
grims from all parts of the habitable globe ; with thousands of miles of 
coast, bays enchantingly beautified, and harbors the very safest known 
to the storm-shivering ships of the sea. 

Why is it that, despite all of these immense advantages, the North 
has so miraculously outstripped the South in prosperity? Why has 
New York outstripped Virginia? Ohio, Kentucky? Illinois, Tennes- 
see ? and any of the Western States, all of the Southern States ? The 
answer is to be found in the simple fact that whenever and wherever 
you find slavery you find an insurmountable obstacle to national pros- 
perity. 

Slavery having once ceased to exist all over the South, her portals 
thrown open to immigration, and Northern energy infused into the 
people, it is easy to look into the future and behold a destiny looming 
up for this bright land, that shall make it, at least, what it must have 
been designed to be, from the first,— the garden of the universe. 

THE CAMPAIGN OF 1 865 LOGAN'S CAMPAIGN SERVICES AP- 
POINTED MINISTER TO MEXICO, BUT DECLINES. 

In the campaign of 1865, General Logan took the stump, 
and rendered valuable services to the Republican Party, not 
confining his efforts to his own State, but going where he 
was most needed. Says the New Era : 

In the fall of 1865, when New York and New Jersey were struggling 
for Republican success, General Logan went to their assistance, and 
his efforts were readily acknowledged by all as having materially aided 
in the glorious result and the redemption of New Jersey from Copper- 
head rule. 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. H 3 

During the winter of 1865-66, General Logan was nomi- 
nated and confirmed by the Senate as Minister to Mexico, 
but although strongly urged to accept the honor, declined it. 

Commenting upon this appointment the New York Her- 
ald said at the time : 

The appointment of General John A. Logan of Illinois as United 
States Minister to the Republic of Mexico is one of the most important 
diplomatic movements that we have ever been called upon to chronicle. 
Although this Government has not yet interfered in the Mexican imbro- 
glio, and has not yet given any material aid to the Mexican Republicans 
who are so gallantly struggling against foreign invaders, still the most 
explicit declarations of the unanimous sentiment of our people upon 
the subject have been placed upon record from time to time. . . . 
Neither Napoleon nor Maximilian can possibly mistake the meaning of 
these repeated popular and official manifestations, and the appointment 
of General Logan as our Minister to Mexico is still more unequivocal. 
There are several circumstances which make the selection of General Lo- 
gan peculiarly appropriate and peculiarly ominous. In the first place, 
he is one of our bravest generals, and all our generals are known to be 
in favor of assisting Juarez, by force if necessary, in resuming the au- 
thority which has been usurped by Maximilian. In the second place, 
General Logan is a personal friend of President Johnson, and as such 
is presumed to fully understand and represent his views. In the next 
place, General Logan's own opinions have already been very plainly 
announced in his public speeches, and especially in that Cooper In- 
stitute speech which attracted such marked attention throughout the 
country ; and, therefore, his appointment is in some sort an indorse- 
ment of all that he has said. . . . We do not suppose that the ap- 
pointment of General Logan will be followed by any overt demonstra- 
tion against the Empire that France has set up upon this continent. 
. . . We hold, however, that the establishment of a foreign empire 
upon this continent, no matter with what intentions, was not a friendly 
act toward this Government, and was beyond the legitimate province 
of Napoleon's policy. For this reason we array ourselves against it. 
. . . What is to come next the future will determine ; but we hope 
that Napoleon will boldly and frankly solve the whole question by 
abandoning his Mexican project. 

It is hardly necessary to add that, soon afterward, Napo- 
leon did abandon it. 



ii 4 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



APPOINTMENT AS MINISTER TO JAPAN, DECLINED ALSO NOMI- 
NATED TO THE FORTIETH CONGRESS FROM THE STATE AT 

LARGE HIS EXTRAORDINARY CANVASS OF ILLINOIS IN 1 866 

MALIGNANT VILIFICATION HIS MAJORITY OF SIXTY THOUSAND ! 

A few months later, the President conferred upon Gen- 
eral Logan another mark of distinction, by tendering him the 
mission to Japan, but this also he refused, preferring to re- 
main a private citizen, in his own native State. He was, 
however, soon called from the ranks of private life again. In 
1866 he was nominated by acclamation by the Republican State 
Convention of Illinois as Congressman-at-large in the Forti- 
eth Congress, a nomination which he did not seek, but which 
he accepted in order to help the success of the ticket. He 
was elected by a majority of nearly sixty thousand votes 
over his Democratic competitor. Said an Illinois paper, 
speaking of General Logan's canvass, November 15, 1866: 

In the campaign just closed, no man has ever before made such a 
canvass in this State ; and the result of it is seen and felt by all. What 
man is there in this country who has made so many sacrifices and done 
so much work in the field and in the political arena as has General 
Logan ? He is bold, fearless, and daring, and fights his political ene- 
mies as he fought on the battlefield. He has been traduced, maligned, 
and slandered during the last two or three years as no man has ever 
been before in the State. He bears it all, and makes the most gallant 
campaign ever won, vindicating himself and his party. His enemies 
hate him and his friends love him. He is always ready to help a friend 
or defend him against the assaults of others. He has ability enough 
for any position. On the battlefield he has proved himself a military 
genius. At the bar he is the equal of any of his profession. On the 
stump he has but few equals. In the United States Senate he would 
soon win an enviable reputation. . . . Logan's voice has been 
heard where the opposition was so strong that his life at times has been 
threatened and in great danger. 

Already, it will be seen, he had attained such prominence 
as to be talked of favorably for United States Senator. It 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 



"5 



was of this campaign that the Chicago Tribune of November 
1, 1866, said: 

No Illinois candidate has ever been subjected to so persistent and 
malignant vilification as Major-General John A. Logan, since he became 
the nominee of the Union men for Congressman-at-large. The lead- 
ing Copperhead organ for the past ten weeks has poured an unceasing 
volley of slanders and abuse upon his head. It has manifested a hate 
and rancor perfectly fiendish. We have never witnessed in partisan 
warfare so much malevolence of feeling. The charges made against 
the gallant soldier have been so false and scandalous as to fill even his 
opponents with disgust and indignation. All honorable Democrats 
have cried Shame ! . '. . But General Logan has conducted an 
honorable and dignified canvass. He has met all the issues fairly and 
manfully. He has presented the Union side of the question with great 
power and convincing force, . . . and has added to his previous 
great popularity wherever he has spoken. 

his magnetic influence his denunciation of andrew 

Johnson's contemplated treason — "the greatest speech 
ever delivered from the stump." 

This campaign was conducted at the time when President 
Johnson's extraordinary policy was developing itself, to the 
alarm of all Union men, — and that policy General Logan de- 
nounced with all his power. The following special despatch 
of October 11, 1866, from Peoria, III, to the New York 
Tribune, shows the magnetism he exercised upon the multi- 
tudes that turned out to listen to his remarkable stump- 
speeches : 

The people of this and adjoining counties without number assembled 
in Peoria to-day to listen to Butler and Logan. Well-informed politi- 
cians say it has been the largest political gathering ever seen in Illinois. 
It is certain that no less than two acres of people, among whom were 
15,000 voters, were assembled in one densely compact mass in the court- 
house yard. 

In the afternoon General Butler made an eloquent argument in sup- 
port of his well-known views of reconstruction. It was listened to with 
unflagging interest, and often applauded. His plea for impartial suf- 



U6 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

frage, founded on the services rendered by the negro in the war, was 
heartily cheered. 

General Logan's speech was worthy of his great reputation as a 
popular orator : no man in Illinois, since the death of Douglas, has so 
wonderful a magnetic influence over a vast audience. 

As further evidence of Logan's wonderful power on the 
stump, it may be stated that Mr. Justice Miller, of the United 
States Supreme Court, while conversing- on this subject with 
his nephew, General Paul Vandevoort, who mentioned the 
same to the writer, said that Logan's speech, about this time, 
at Keokuk, la., was, he believed, the greatest speech ever de- 
livered from the stump. " It was the greatest," he said, " be- 
cause of its wonderful effect upon the audience ; the greatest, 
because it converted to the Republican cause more Demo- 
crats than had ever before or since, to his knowledge, been 
so converted." 

CONGRESSMAN LOGAN AFTER THE WAR HIS SPEECH ON RECON- 
STRUCTION DEFENCE OF THE REPUBLICAN PARTY'S POLICY 

HE RIDDLES ANDREW JOHNSON'S RECONSTRUCTION POLICY 

PENITENCE BEFORE FORGIVENESS A RENEWED " LOYALTY " 

THE KEY-NOTE OF PROPER RECONSTRUCTION. 

On July 12, 1867, following his re-election to Congress, 
Representative Logan delivered a powerful and eloquent 
speech on the "Supplementary Reconstruction Bill" then 
pending, in which he severely handled the Northern Copper- 
heads, who had falsely charged the Republican House with 
having subverted the Constitution and trampled in the dust 
the liberties of the people. After proceeding for some time, 
despite frequent interruptions from the Democratic side, and 
knock-down rejoinders from himself, Mr. Logan continued as 
follows : 

What I am anxious to learn, Mr. Speaker, is, upon what foundation 
rests this flippant and gratuitous charge, repeatedly made against the 
Republican Party on this floor, to the effect that we are trampling lib- 
erty under foot, and destroying the rights and privileges of a portion of 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 1Y y 

the American people ? Wherein have we violated the Constitution ? 
Was it in crushing the rebellion ? I have no doubt every Copperhead 
in the North would say yes. We did carry the emblem of our National 
glory and greatness from the rivers and the lakes of the West to the bays 
and the gulfs of the South, where it waves to-day, and will wave for- 
ever ; but in doing so we innocently thought, hoped, and believed then, 
and still honestly think, hope, and believe, that we were erecting around 
the Constitution impregnable bulwarks, and laying for liberty a deeper 
and a broader foundation in the gratitude, confidence, and affections of 
our people. We never dreamed that for every rebel we killed in the 
South, we were to make an eternal enemy in the North ; and we do 
think it amounts to a riddle beyond the comprehension of mortal wits, 
how it is that very many of the brave men who fought us, and whom 
we had to literally overwhelm before we could conquer, now that they 
are conquered, are much more ready to ask forgiveness, and forget the 
past and be friends, as we all ought to be again, than are their allies, 
who, however deep their sympathy with them may have been while the 
war was raging, took special pains to let the danger pass before they 
gave it an airing. God forbid that the day shall ever dawn upon this 
Republic when the patriots whose patriotism won them crutches and 
wooden limbs shall have apologies and explanations to make for their 
public-spirited conduct to patriots who boast of and abuse the privilege 
of eulogizing as their brethren the men whose sabres drank loyal blood 
and whose bullets shot away loyal limbs. 

The next greatest wrong that they have to complain of is, that the 
men who had the pluck to stand by those who in the field had to fight 
our country's battles, presumptuously aspire to make our laws. I think 
thus far these have vindicated their claims to the world's respect alike 
on the field and in the halls of legislation. What is the basis upon 
which they fought? Simply that rebellion was a crime. They tri- 
umphed. Now upon what basis have they legislated ? Simply that 
rebellion was a crime— and they will triumph again. The people will 
never require us to fight upon one principle and legislate on another — 
to shed our blood on the field, and then come here to make apologies 
for it to men who wanted us whipped. 

When the South can be loyally represented on this floor upon the 
basis proposed by Congress, the problem of reconstruction will cease to 
vex the discussions of this hall. 

The prime, sole, and supreme object of the Republican Party is to 
re-establish this Government upon a sure foundation of loyalty, against 



XI g LIFE OF LOGAN. 

whicli the frothy waves of treason may fret forever in vain. We have 
survived one rebellion, and the sage suggestions of past experience 
warn us that it will be wiser to prevent another rebellion than to too 
confidently expect to survive it. 

Now, Mr. Speaker, let us examine a little further into this question. 
I perhaps may not have stated all the reasons that actuated these gen- 
tlemen in denouncing this side of the House, and thereby denouncing 
every loyal man in the country, every man who has shown his loyalty 
by his efforts to restore this Government on a proper basis. The recent 
rebellion while it was in progress was led by men who belonged to the 
same party to which the gentleman from Brooklyn [Mr. Robinson, to 
whom he was replying] now belongs, and the party to which I belonged 
until I became so thoroughly ashamed of it that I left it. . . 

The reason why these gentlemen desire to-day to bring into disre- 
pute the action of members of this House is because their action is cal- 
culated to prevent a portion of the people of the Southern country, who 
are in full sympathy with them, from voting and holding office. Who 
are they? Outspoken rebels, who rose in arms against the Govern- 
ment ; the men who conspired to destroy this glorious Republic. Be- 
cause 'these men are disfranchised and prevented from exercising the 
rights of American citizens, gentlemen on the other side object to our pro- 
posed plan of reconstruction. Sir, they would have the Southern States 
reconstructed according to the plan of Andrew Johnson, the gentleman 
who is so immaculate that if we should attempt to impeach him it will, 
according to the gentleman from Brooklyn, amount to a public calami- 
ty. What was the plan of Andrew Johnson ? Why, sir, that plan pro- 
posed to declare that those States that had engaged in rebellion had 
never lost any of their rights in the Government ; that neither they nor 
their citizens had forfeited any of their privileges under the Constitution 
of the United States. In other words, that treason was not a crime, 
that rebels were patriots. It proposed to invite the rebels to hold elec- 
tions, and send to this hall per se secessionists and traitors. In short, 
to construct a new party, in reconstructing the Government, in which 
the secession rebels of the South might unite with the Copperhead 
rebels of the North, capture the citadel of power here, make treason 
honorable, and loyalty odious. There is nothing that, to regain its lost 
power, the Democratic Party would not willingly do. If it could ac- 
quire to-morrow more power by crushing under its iron heel the South 
than it could by succoring it, it would hurl at its Southern brethren 
thick and fast 

" Curses of hate and hisses of scorn." 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. U 9 

Their history well establishes the fact that — 
" Their friendship is a lurking snare, 
Their honor but an idle breath, 
Their smile the smile that traitors wear; 
Their love is hate, their life is death." 

Their sympathy with Andrew Johnson's plan of reconstruction, and 
their hostility to the Republican plan of reconstruction, is not attributa- 
ble to the merits or demerits of either plan as a policy for the country, 
but solely as a party policy. 

Now, sir, I maintain that the only true plan upon which these South- 
ern States ought to have been reconstructed is by virtue of an organi- 
zation of military governments, and the principal objection which I find 
to the bill now pending before this House, albeit I shall vote for it, is, 
that it fails to state with sufficient explicitness that the governments of 
these States were entirely overthrown and destroyed by the treason and 
rebellion of the people, and that no legal civil governments have existed 
there since. I would recognize no governors or other officers pretend- 
ing to act there now in an official capacity, but would remove them 
instanter. I would insist that when the fiery billows of war rolled over 
the South, they bore away, into the broad ocean of chaos, their laws and 
constitutions, as the floods of their own mighty Father of Waters sweep 
the drift-wood they gather into the Mexican Gulf ; and that, according 
to the laws of war, they were subject only to military rule at the hands 
of their conquerors, and so ought to remain until traitors shall learn how 
to blush for their crimes, and modestly decline office instead of attempt- 
ing, as they now do daily, to thrust themselves forward to grasp the 
reins of a Government that they hate in their hearts. I would put them 
on probation, and make their return to power depend upon the merits 
of their penitence. 

But let us return to the gentleman's grave charges of outrage and 
wrong supposed to have been committed by this Congress. To be 
charitable, we will have to give the gentleman, and his party, credit for 
a memory as full of treachery as their Southern brethren were of treason. 
They seem to have forgotten everything they ought to remember, and 
remember some things they certainly ought not only to forget them- 
selves, but want everybody else to forget. They seem to have forgotten 
the scenes and events that mark the historical epoch through which we 
have so recently passed, and they seem to have totally forgotten that 
these pet Southern brethren of theirs, when they did occupy seats on 
this floor, gave us practical illustrations of dignity in debate that made 
of this Hall a "bear garden," much more attractive to lovers of gladia- 
torial sports and patrons of the " fancy " than to the wise, prudent, 



120 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

sedate, and good citizen ; when bowie-knives bristled from their breasts, 
revolvers filled all their pockets, and clubs were substituted among them 
for canes ; when they spoke to a Northern legislator in these halls, with 
scowls on their brows, threats on their lips, and fingers on triggers. 
. . . They seem to have forgotten the price the peace we enjoy 
to-day has cost this Nation, and the crimson currency in which it was 
paid ; the broken hearts with which it filled bruised and troubled bosoms 
at home ; the mangled bodies with which it filled the hospitals every- 
where, and the lifeless forms of manly beauty with which it filled hun- 
dreds of thousands of nameless graves on the far-off battle-plains of the 
South. They seem to have forgotten the bitter, scalding tears that 
rolled like floods of lava down the fair faces of the loyal mothers, wives, 
and sisters of this land when the names ineffably dear to them were 
found announced in the long lists of the killed that were published as a 
sequel to the first flash of the lightning that reported a battle had been 
fought ; and I dare say they have forgotten that there ever was such a 
prison as Andersonville, and the long, long catalogue of horrors that 
brave men had to suffer there for being true to themselves, their Con- 
stitution, their flag, their homes, families, and country. Well for such 
gentlemen would it be, if they could occasionally meet, as they wander 
daily over this broad country, a few, of the many wan spectres of suf- 
fering and woe, who were captured by the saintly Southern brethren of 
Northern Democrats on fields of strife, thrust into prisons unfit for 
dogs, and starved till a hale constitution was a wreck, and then left to 
suffer the worst penalties of privation incident to weather and climate. 
I could give my friend from Brooklyn illustrations of individual suffer- 
ing at Andersonville that would make the hair stand on his head, the 
blood freeze in his veins, and curses spring involuntarily to his lips. I 
remember one poor boy from my immediate vicinity, especially. His 
name is Dougherty. He went into Andersonville prison without a scar 
on his young body or a cloud on his fair brow, but under the humani- 
tarianism of Southern chivalry he came out without a foot to walk on. 
They were literally frozen off, in prison. 



I trust, Mr. Speaker, that we will pass such a bill as may be under- 
stood, properly construed, and energetically executed, and that when it 
is, that it will leave the Southern State governments in the hands of 
men loyal and true, and forever prevent disloyal men from employing 
power and place to foment treason. It is not when they come, but how 
they come, that is the all-important point with me. I would be glad to 
welcome them back to-morrow if I were satisfied they were reorganized 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. I2I 

aright ; but it is my intention to vote, as long as I have a vote here, to 
keep them out until they can come in on the broad basis of loyalty to 
the Government. And when they can do that, I am willing to receive 
their Representatives to the Halls of our National Legislature, and 
will assist to protect them against anything in anywise prejudicial to 
any of their legal rights or interests as States. . . . The hour they 
discover they possess the good sense and courage to repudiate openly 
and emphatically treason, and embrace warmly and sincerely loyalty, 
they will see dawn upon them the bright morning of their regeneration 
and deliverance. 

THE REASON WHY THE DEMOCRATIC LEADERS HATED LOGAN 

HOW LOGAN SAVED TO THE GOVERNMENT NEARLY ONE MILL- 
ION DOLLARS. 

That detraction in its worst forms is always to be ex- 
pected by any candidate on the Republican Presidential ticket, 
"goes without saying." That such a grand figure — grand in 
peace as it was heroic in war — as its recent candidate for the 
Vice-Presidency presented, would be subjected to all the as- 
saults that Democratic envy, hatred, and uncharitableness 
could inspire, was to be expected. But Logan was used to 
that sort of thing. He had been through that sort of fire be- 
fore, and came out then as victorious as he did when con- 
fronted by the storms of Confederate missiles in the war, and 
Democratic missiles, rattling against the armor of his patriot- 
ism and purity, fell harmless at his feet, in 1884, as they had in 
previous years. We are tempted to this digression by the 
fact that it was in this same speech before the House of Rep- 
resentatives — now, twenty years ago, — that he gave the rea- 
son of this special hostility of the Democratic leaders to him, 
in these telling words : 

The unrelenting war waged against me by the Democracy is liable 
to be misunderstood if looked at superficially. It is not because, as has 
been suspected by some, I was a Detnocrat and am one no longer. Dying 
out as it has been, slowly but painfully, for the last eight years, with 
the dry-rot, that party has become too much accustomed to see men of 
sense withdraw their allegiance from it, to make my instance a source 



I22 LIFE OF IOGAN. 

of serious irritation. The true reason, which explains the malevolence 
with which they pursue me, will be found in the fact that while the recent 
war was raging, the honorable distinction was awarded to me of having put 
to the suwrd my full share of their party, who fell fighting in front of my com- 
mand under the spotted flag of treason to support their sentiments and prin- 
ciples. 

It was during the session of 1867-68, while Andrew John- 
son was still President, and Hugh McCulloch Secretary of 
the Treasury, that General Logan's vigilant watchfulness 
saved to the Government nearly one million dollars. An 
Illinois paper of that time thus alludes to this important ser- 
vice : 

Could the history of the present session of Congress be fully written 
out, it would be found that General John A. Logan, the only member 
representing an entire State, is no less distinguished in his services than 
in his constituency. He is not confined to strictly political labors, 
neither does he waste time in buncombe speeches. To illustrate the 
practical nature of his services take his connection with the Sundry 
Civil Expenses Bill pending in Congress, for " necessary expenses " con- 
nected with the Government bonds, notes, etc. The estimate for this 
appropriation, when it came from the Treasury, was $2,900,000, which 
amount excited the curiosity of the Committee on Appropriations. It 
was explained to them by the Secretary, that it was to pay employes 
in the Note and Bond Printing Bureau, and for paper and other ma- 
terials. The committee thereupon cut it down to $1,500,000, but Gen- 
eral Logan, having recently had an experience of the wasteful manner 
in which paper is used in that bureau, and having seen considerable of 
the loose way in which this business is transacted, thought a little further 
examination would do no harm. He thereupon procured an account of 
the actual and necessary expenditures of the bureau for the month of 
February, 1868, and found them to be $47,000. He then multiplied this 
number by twelve, for the twelve months of the year, and moved to 
amend the bill by striking out the $1,500,000 and inserting $565,000. 
This motion was agreed to. It will be seen from this, that General 
Logan saved the Government from being robbed of nearly one million 
dollars in this one instance ! To the Philadelphia Ledger belongs the 
credit of being the first to call especial attention to this service of our 
Congressman-at-large. Such a member cannot be spared from the 
Halls of Congress. 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. , I2 ^ 

LOGAN THRICE COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF OF THE GRAND ARMY OF 
THE REPUBLIC — OBJECTS OF THAT ORDER, AS STATED BY 
HIMSELF HE INSTITUTES THE ANNUAL MEMORIAL, OR DEC- 
ORATION DAY. 

In January, 1868, General Logan's comrades of the Grand 
Army of the Republic elected him commander-in-chief of that 
order, and afterward honored him and themselves by twice 
re-electing - him to that distinguished position. It was during 
his first incumbency that General Logan, as commander-in- 
chief of this military society, issued the order — which he 
often afterward alluded to as u the proudest act of my life," — 
setting apart the 30th of May as a day in memory of the dead 
soldiers who lost their lives to perpetuate this Union, — a day 
on which to decorate their sacred graves and keep in mind 
their glorious deeds. This memorable order, — which was is- 
sued to all the comrades of the " Grand Army of the Repub- 
lic " throughout the land, — was in these inspiring words : 

Headquarters Grand Army of the Republic, 
Adjutant-General's Office, 
446 14TH Street, Washington, D. C, May 5, 1868. 
General Orders, No. 11. 

I. The 30th day of May, 1868, is designated for the purpose of 
strewing with flowers, or otherwise decorating, the graves of comrades 
who died in defence of their country during the late rebellion, and 
whose bodies now lie in almost every city, village, hamlet, and church- 
yard in the land. In this observance, no form of ceremony is pre- 
scribed, but posts and comrades will, in their own way, arrange such 
fitting services and testimonials of respect, as circumstances may per- 
mit. 

We are organized, comrades, as our regulations tell us, for the pur- 
pose, among other things, " of preserving and strengthening those kind 
and fraternal feelings which have bound together the soldiers, sailors, 
and marines, who united together to suppress the late rebellion." 
What can aid more to assure this result than by cherishing tenderly the 
memory of our heroic dead, who made their breasts a barricade between 
our country and its foes. Their soldier lives were the reveille of free- 
dom to a race in chains, and their deaths the tattoo of rebellious tyranny 



124 LIFE 0F LOGAN. 

in arms. We should guard their graves with sacred vigilance. All that 
the consecrated wealth and taste of the nation can add, to their adorn- 
ment and security, is but a fitting tribute to the memory of her slain 
defenders. Let no wanton foot tread rudely on such hallowed grounds. 
Let pleasant paths invite the coming and going of reverent visitors and 
fond mourners. Let no vandalism of avarice or neglect, no ravages of 
time, testify to the present or to the coming generations that we have 
forgotten, as a people, the cost of a free and undivided Republic. 

If other eyes grow dull, and other hands slack, and other hearts 
grow cold in the solemn trust, ours shall keep it well, as long as the 
light and warmth of life remain to us. 

Let us, then, at the time appointed, gather around their sacred re- 
mains, and garland the passionless mounds above them with the 
choicest flowers of spring-time ; let us raise above them the dear old flag 
they saved from dishonor ; let us, in this solemn presence, renew our 
pledges to aid and assist those whom they have left among us, a sacred 
charge upon a nation's gratitude, — the soldier's and sailor's widow and 
orphan. 

II. It is the purpose of the Commander-in-Chief to inaugurate this 
observance, with the hope that it will be kept up from year to year, 
while a survivor of the war remains to honor the memory of his departed 
comradesJ[ He earnestly desires the public press to call attention to 
this order, and lend its friendly aid in bringing it to the notice of com- 
rades in all parts of the country, in time for simultaneous compliance 
therewith. 

III. Department commanders will use every effort to make this 
order effective. 

By order of John A. Logan, 

Comtnander-in- Chief. 
Official. N. P. Chipman, Adjutant-General. 

This order having - been generally complied with through- 
out the country, with beautiful and touching ceremonies at the 
graves of the dead, Mr. Logan on June 22, 1868, introduced 
a resolution in the House of Representatives, which was 
unanimously adopted, in these words: 

Resolved, That the proceedings of the different cities, towns, etc., re- 
cently held in commemoration of the gallant heroes who have sacrificed 
their lives in defence of the Republic, and the record of the ceremonial 
of the decoration of the honored tombs of the departed, shall be collected 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 12 $ 

and bound, under the direction of such person as the Speaker shall 
designate, for the use of Congress. 

Since then, as is well known, Decoration Day has been 
observed as a National Holiday nearly everywhere in the 
United States. 

PASSAGES FROM ONE OF HIS MEMORIAL-DAY ORATIONS A 

THRILLING WAR-PICTURE. 

The objects of the " Grand Army" were further set forth 
by Commander-in-Chief Logan, in a Decoration-day oration, 
at Du Quoin, 111., May 30, 1869, as follows: 

The Grand Army of the Republic has been organized on nearly the 
same basis as "The Cincinnati," and for nearly the same object. It is 
a secret society, taken from the order of our forefathers, and here are 
the first-fruits of that society. It was not organized for the purpose of 
raising any one man or set of men, or party, to position or power, but 
for the purpose of preserving the names and memories of those heroes 
who have fallen in the contest for their country's life, and for protecting 
their widows and orphans. And from that society proceeds this idea of 
strewing their comrades' graves with flowers. From it, the order was 
issued for the purpose of keeping their memories ever green in the 
minds of the living, and to perpetuate in the hearts of the people of 
this country the principle that lives in this Government, and for which 
our comrades died — the great principle of liberty, the idea of freedom 
and universal equality in our Government under the laws, so far as in- 
dividual rights are concerned. The great and glorious objects for which 
these men poured out their blood and forfeited their lives should be 
kept alive in each heart. This is the grand idea we have in view. 
. . . Believing that they were right, and that their cause was a 
holy one, we have gathered around these sacred mounds to-day for the 
purpose of solemnly pledging ourselves that this noble purpose shall 
be carried out by us while we live ; and that we will teach it to our chil- 
dren, so that when we too are numbered with the dead, those who re- 
main may catch up the refrain of liberty and inspire every bosom with 
zeal to emulate the deeds of those who sleep before us. For this pur- 
pose, and with this noble object in view, we mutually pledge ourselves, 
one to another. 

In all of General Logan's speeches, whether orations or 
otherwise, there run veins of true eloquence. In the oration 



126 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

already referred to, occurs this thrilling picture of the patriot- 
ism enkindled by the War of the Rebellion : 

At a time when a dark and threatening cloud rolled up from our 
Southern horizon, and the muttering of the distant thunder-roar was 
heard, and fierce lightning shot from behind the murky folds — a time 
when the angry growl of war reverberated across the land in deep and 
threatening tones, — then it was that each patriot looked the coming 
storm in the face ; it was then, when our beloved country was trembling 
in the balance of fate, that these noble-hearted heroes embarked in the 
cause of liberty. And when the first fire of the enemy's guns leaped 
forth, it kindled a patriotic blaze in the heart of each man and woman 
in the land who loved our flag, the glorious Stars and Stripes. And 
this fire, once kindled, glowed and burned until it swelled to one mighty 
blaze of patriotism that swept across the continent as the fiery sheet 
drives along the dry prairie, and twenty millions of Columbia's sons 
and daughters wheeled into the ranks of loyalty and patriotism — a 
mighty host, evincing their devotion to their flag and country, swearing 
before God and men that the precious liberties purchased by the blood 
of their forefathers should never be sacrificed to the arm of treason or 
to foreign foe. There was a grand gathering then. It was the gather- 
ing of patriotic hosts — 

In arms the huts and hamlets rose ; 
From winding glen, from upland town, 
They poured each hardy tenant down ; 

Prompt at the signal of alarms 

Each son of freedom rushed to arms ! 

From city and country, from hill and valley, mountain and plain, at 
freedom's call the bands of patriots came. Like a whirlwind the flame 
rushed over the land from side to side, and the universal watchword 
was, " This country shall be free." Such was the deep determination 
of every true heart. Then you could see the great moving mass going 
forward, not like the dark and stealthy mist creeping up from the 
murky swamps, but like the bright aurora rising and spreading his beams 
of azure light. Then it was that freemen united for the purpose of wiping 
out, with a strong and mighty arm, the dark stain that had gathered 
on the bright escutcheon of our liberty. What a scene was then pre- 
sented ! See the long line of patriots as they come down the valley and 
over the mountains ! Hear the clash of arms, and the deep boom of 
the cannon ! Bugle notes in the morning summoned men to take the flag 
of our country in hand, and carry it everywhere throughout the Nation, 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 



127 



and thus show to the world that our Republican form of government is 
a thing worth preserving, worth even dying for. 

This was an exhibition of patriotic devotion worthy of imitation by 
all those who may come after them. 

And further on, in the same oration, looking at the war 
with the eyes of Christian patriotism and a wide, far-seeing 
statesmanship, Logan continued : 

I have said, on former occasions, that these men who died for their 
country, did not die alone that our flag should wave over the land ; that 
there was more in the contest than this. Civilization was at stake, 
Christianity was at stake, and liberty most certainly hung upon the re- 
sult of the contest. I have said that, through the death of these men, 
not only was the flag of the Republic — that emblem of our liberty — pre- 
served, but that Christianity achieved a victory. For just below the 
sacred cross waves the flag of freedom, the former forever overlooking 
the latter. And I say it for the reason that, as far back as the history 
of the world reaches, we find, whenever the sword has entered any free 
and enlightened nation to destroy it, as the nation suffered so has its 
civilization and Christianity suffered. Turn your eyes to the history of 
the Old World, and glance over its pages, and there you will find this 
truth verified, that wherever rebellion has destroyed governments lib- 
eral in their forms, their civil and religious progress has been blighted. 
Once the honor most esteemed by enlightened and brave men was to 
be called a Roman citizen. Rome was the mistress of nations, and for 
a time a mighty republic, the home of freedom, civilization, and culture. 
But what is it now ? A pile of majestic ruins — records of its departed 
greatness. And so with other nations. Italy, once a proud and inde- 
pendent people, now a nation of organ-grinders and pedlers. Athens, 
once the seat of learning, now lives only in its ruins and history. Jeru- 
salem, the Holy City and seat of the Christian religion, now in the 
hands of Oriental bigots. The verdict of history is that, where liberty 
is destroyed, Christianity sinks into darkness. Hence, I say, that those 
men fought not only for the protection of our flag, but also for the 
preservation of Christianity in this land ; for Christianity cannot long 
flourish where liberty is destroyed. If one dies, the other fades away. 
Civilization follows the Bible. Liberty and Christianity go together. 
If one dies the other dies also. And so it was in this land — the preser- 
vation of our flag and the free institutions of this country, was the 
preservation of the Christian religion as much as it was of the liberties 
of the people. And if we ask ourselves whether we believe this, I think 



128 LIFE OF IOGAN. 

our response must be, We do. Then we say, These men have not died 
in vain. They perished in a righteous cause. And every man and 
woman in the country should honor their names, and hold their memory 
sacred, so long as the flag of Christian freedom floats above the waves 
of superstition and anarchy. 

IMPEACHMENT OF ANDREW JOHNSON LOGAN ONE OF THE 

MANAGERS ON THE PART OF THE HOUSE HIS GREAT 

EFFORT BEFORE THE COURT OF IMPEACHMENT WHAT SUM- 
NER, AND OTHERS, THOUGHT OF IT. 

It was on February 24, 1868, that the House of Represen- 
tatives decided to impeach Andrew Johnson, President of the 
United States, of high crimes and misdemeanors. On the 
2d of March following, eleven articles of impeachment were 
agreed upon by the House, and on the 4th were duly pre- 
sented to the Senate sitting as a High Court of Impeach- 
ment, by the managers on the part of the House, who were 
accompanied by the House, — the Grand Inquest of the 
Nation, — as a Committee of the Whole on the State of the 
Union. Representative Logan was one of the managers. 
The trial commenced on March 13th, and continued until 
May 26th, when the Senate sitting as such court adjourned 
sine die. Conviction could only be had on any of the articles 
by a two-thirds vote of the fifty-four votes then in the Senate; 
or, in other words, by a vote of 36 "guilty" to 18 "not 
guilty." The result of the trial was non-conviction, although 
the fact that three several articles of impeachment secured a 
vote of 35 "guilty" to 19 "not guilty" sufficiently attested 
the slenderness of the thread by which the Damoclesian 
sword hung above Andrew Johnson's guilty head. One re- 
sult of the trial was that he was convicted in the minds of the 
people, and his great power for harm rendered innocuous. 
The argument of Manager Logan in this case, covering 
eighteen pages of the Congressional Globe, was a legal mas- 
terpiece, the opening being especially fine. In that opening, 
after modestly referring to the reluctance with which he 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 1 29 

entered upon the performance of this transcendent duty, and 
declaring- that the cause was too great to be weakened by his 
weakness, he proceeded to the arraignment, passages in 
which are unsurpassed in power of statement and force of 
diction by anything in the English language. Said he : 

I wish to assure you, senators, — I wish most earnestly and sincerely 
to assure the learned and honorable counsel for the defence, — that we 
speak not only for ourselves, but for the great body of people, when we 
say that we regret this occasion, and we regret the necessity which has 
devolved this duty upon us. Heretofore, sirs, it has been the pride of 
every American to point to the Chief Magistrate of his nation. It has 
been his boast that to that great office have always been brought the 
most pre-eminent purity, the most undoubted integrity, and the most 
unquestioned loyalty which the country could produce. However fierce 
might be the strife of party, however clamorous might be the cry of 
politics, however desperate might be the struggles of leaders and of 
factions, it has always been felt that the President of the United States 
was an administrator of the law in all its force and example, and would 
be a promoter of the welfare of his country in all its perils and adversi- 
ties. Such have been the hopes, and such has been the reliance, of the 
people at large ; and, in consequence, the Chief Executive chair has 
come to assume in the hearts of Americans a form so sacred, and a 
name so spotless, that nothing impure could attach to the one and noth- 
ing dishonorable could taint the other. To do aught or to say aught 
which may disturb this cherished feeling, will be to destroy one of the 
dearest impressions to which our people cling. 

And yet, sirs, this is our duty to-day. We are here to show that 
President Johnson, the man whom this country once honored, is un- 
fitted for his place. We are here to show that in his person he has vio- 
lated the honor and sanctity of his office. We are here to show that he 
has usurped the power of his position and the emoluments of his pat- 
ronage. We are here to show that he has not only wilfully violated 
the law, but has maliciously commanded its infringement. We are here 
to show that he has deliberately done those things which he ought not 
to have done, and that he has criminally left undone those things which 
he ought to have done. 

He has betrayed his countrymen that he might perpetuate his 
power, and has sacrificed their interests that he might swell his author- 
ity. He has made the good of the people subordinate to his ambition, 
and the harmony of the community second to his desires. He has stood 
9 



I50 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

in the way which would have led the dismembered States back to pros- 
perity and peace, and has instigated them to the path which led to dis- 
cord and to strife. He has obstructed acts which were intended to heal, 
and has counselled the course which was intended to separate. The dif- 
ferences which he might have reconciled by his voice, he has stimulated 
by his example. The questions which might have been amicably set- 
tled by his acquiescence, have been aggravated by his insolence ; and 
in all those instances whereof we in our articles complain, he has made 
his prerogatives a burden to the commonwealth instead of a blessing to 
his constituents. 

And it is not alone that in his public course he has been shameless 
and guilty, but that his private conduct has been incendiary and malig- 
nant. It is not only that he has notoriously broken the law, but that he 
has criminally scoffed at the framers of the law. By public harangue, and 
by political arts, he has sought to cast odium upon Congress, and to in- 
sure credit for himself; and thus, in a government where equal respect 
and dignity should be observed in reference to the power and authority 
conferred upon each of its several departments, he has attempted to 
subvert their just proportions and to arrogate to himself their respective 
jurisdictions. It is for these things, senators, that to-day he stands im- 
peached ; and it is because of these, that the people have bid us prose- 
cute. That we regret it, I have said ; that they regret it, I repeat ; and 
though it tears away the beautiful belief with which, like a drapery, 
they had invested the altar, yet they feel that the time has come when 
they must expose and expel the sacrilegious priest, in order to protect 
and preserve the purity of the temple. 

There are, in this great legal argument, many passages 
of equal force and majestic beauty, to quote which would un- 
duly swell this brief sketch. Suffice it to say that the speech, 
throughout, was one of the most brilliant, cogent, and ex- 
haustive of any with which that august tribunal was at once 
instructed and captivated. The amount of research Mr. 
Logan evinced in it, by citations from all the great English 
and American authorities, whether as to the powers of sus- 
pension from office during impeachment, the proper methods 
and rules governing the procedure, the class of crimes and 
misdemeanors that are impeachable, the distinction between 
impeachment and consequent suspension and punishment by 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 131 

indictment, the determination of the " intent, " or in his very 
able exposition of the constitutional rights and powers of the 
President, was remarkable, while the analysis of the evidence 
was close and logical. The summing-up was no less thor- 
ough and powerful, as the following brief extract will show : 

From the 14th day of April, 1865, to this day, as shown by the tes- 
timony, he has been consistent only with himself and the evil spirits of 
his administration. False to the people who took him from obscurity 
and conferred on him splendor ; who dug him from that oblivion to 
which he had been consigned by the treason of his State, and gave him 
that distinction which, as disclosed by his subsequent acts, he never 
merited, and has so fearfully scandalized, disgraced, and dishonored ; 
false to the memory of him whose death made him President ; false to 
the principles of our contest for national life; false to the Constitution 
and laws of the land, and his oath of office ; filled with all vanity, lust, and 
pride ; substituting, with the most disgusting self-complacency and ig- 
norance, his own coarse, brutalized will for the will of the people, and 
substituting his vulgar, vapid, and ignorant utterances for patriotism, 
statesmanship, and faithful public service,— he has completed his circle 
of high crimes and misdemeanors ; and, thanks to Almighty God, by 
the imbedded wisdom of our fathers found in the Constitution of our 
country, he stands to-day, with all his crimes upon his head, uncovered 
before the world, at the bar of this the most august tribunal upon earth, 
to receive the awful sentence that awaits him, as a fitting punishment 
for the crimes and misdemeanors of which he stands impeached by the 
House of Representatives, in the name and on behalf of all the people. 

The world in after-times will read the history of the administration 
of Andrew Johnson as an illustration of the depth to which political 
and official perfidy can descend. Amid the unhealed, ghastly scars of 
war ; surrounded by the weeds of widowhood and cries of orphanage ; 
associating with and sustained by the soldiers of the Republic, of whom 
at one time he claimed to be one ; surrounded by the men who had 
supported, aided, and cheered Mr. Lincoln through the darkest hours 
and sorest trials of his sad yet immortal administration — men whose 
lives had been dedicated to the cause of justice, law, and universal 
liberty — the men who had nominated and elected him to the second 
office in the Nation at a time when he scarcely dared visit his own home 
because of the traitorous instincts of his own people ; yet, as shown 
by his official acts, messages, speeches, conversations, and associations, 



132 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



almost from the time when the blood of Lincoln was warm on the floor 
of Ford's Theatre, Andrew Johnson was contemplating treason to all 
the fresh fruits of the overthrown and crushed rebellion, and an affilia- 
tion with, and a practical, official, and hearty sympathy for, those who 
had cost us hecatombs of slain citizens, billions of treasure, and an 
almost ruined country. His great aim and purpose has been to sub- 
vert law, usurp authority, insult and outrage Congress, reconstruct the 
rebel States in the interests of treason, insult the memories and rest- 
ing-places of our heroic dead, outrage the feelings and deride the prin- 
ciples of the living men who aided in saving the Union, and deliver all 
that was snatched from wreck and ruin into the hands of unrepentant, 
but, by him, pardoned traitors. 

We are not doubtful of your verdict. Andrew Johnson has long 
since been tried by the whole people and found guilty, and you can but 
confirm that judgment already pronounced by the sovereign American 
people. 

Of this great forensic effort, the effect and power of which 
can only be judged in its entirety and not by disjointed quota- 
tions of any length, much less by such brief ones as have been 
given herein, the Washington Chronicle said at the time : 

The argument of Hon. John A. Logan on the impeachment of the 
President, which was filed on Wednesday, is one of the greatest efforts of 
its gifted author. Mr. Logan has long since established his reputation 
as an orator. Eloquence with him is a natural endowment, the result 
of his copiousness of expression and his ardent temperament, combined 
with quick and vigorous intellectual powers. Such men often neglect 
the severer studies without which the most brilliant natural gifts can- 
not secure substantial eminence. If there are any who have doubted 
General Logan's abilities as an argumentative speaker, his present 
effort must satisfy them. His argument is most thorough and search- 
ing. Taking up point after point in defence of the President, he ex- 
poses their feebleness, insufficiency, or irrelevancy, and supports the 
charges of the House of Representatives not only by trenchant logic, 
but by a thorough, searching analysis of the constitutional and legal 
provisions applicable to the case, by copious citations from the opinions 
of the great lights of the past, and by a forcible statement of the salient 
facts developed in the testimony. The concluding portion, in which 
he sums up the case against the President, is fully worthy of his high 
reputation as an orator. 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 1 ^Z 

Prominent men, and classical scholars, were loud in praise 
of this speech. Senator Sumner said of it : " It is capital ! 
capital ! — one of the best arguments I have read for many a 
day." Samuel Wilkinson said of it : " It is the best speech I 
ever read." And, among the great number of journals that 
alluded to it in terms of high praise, the Mississippi Journal 
said : 

We have been favored with a copy of the celebrated speech of Hon. 
John A. Logan, on Impeachment, and, after a studious perusal, must 
pronounce it one of the orator's most brilliant efforts. The sterling 
arguments, free from metaphors or ornament, remind the classical 
scholar of the orations of Cicero or Demosthenes, while, at the same 
time, the chaste elegance of a fervent imagination reveals treasures of 
thought and strength of reasoning that would do honor to the most 
distinguished habitues of the Roman forum. 

PENSIONS FOR THE WAR OF l8l2 LOGAN ADVOCATES THE BILL 

AND EXPLAINS THE TRUE GROUND UPON WHICH PENSIONS 
ARE GRANTED. 

It may be well to mention here, as showing the strong 
ground upon which he, even at this day, stood with respect 
to pensions, that, early in 1868, the House of Representa- 
tives having before it a bill to grant pensions to the soldiers 
of the war of 181 2, in the debate upon it, General Logan 
made a speech in favor of the bill, in which the following 
strong passages occur : 

From the best data that we can get, there are very few of the sol- 
diers of the 181 2 war, surviving. The survivors must average seventy or 
seventy-five years of age. Forty-eight years after the close of the revo- 
olutionary war, pensions were granted to the soldiers who had defended 
the country in that war. A pension was granted to each and every one 
of the soldiers then surviving. Why was it granted ? Not, because it 
took but a small sum of money out of the Treasury. I ask the gentle- 
men of the House to reflect for one moment upon the principle on 
which we grant a pension to a soldier. In granting pensions, do we 
vote with reference to the amount of money, small or large, that the 
payment of the pensions will, take ? No, sir. We pass such acts upon 



134 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



the principle th.it the soldier has done his duty to his country, and that 
the country is under obligation to provide for him for the remainder of 
his life, if he need such provision. When we grant pensions to wounded 
soldiers, we do not inquire how many wounded soldiers there are, and 
how much money it will take to provide a pension for all of them. We 
do not determine the question upon any such conditions. We vote 
pensions because we believe that a man who, in defending his country, 
has met the shock of battle, and has thus received wounds, deserves the 
gratitude of his country, and is entitled to its protecting care in his de- 
clining years. 

I say then, in reference to this bill, that the men, for whom it is in- 
tended to provide, are entitled to pensions. Why ? Not because they 
are few, or because they are many, but because they defended the lib- 
erties of this country at a time when their defence was needed. These 
men are now old, and they need the protection and succor of the coun- 
try. They ask the Congress of the United States to give them a small 
pittance that will assist them in their declining years. I, for one, am 
willing to grant it. 

More than fifty years have passed since these men met the storm of 
battle in defending this government against the Britons who were in- 
vading our soil. For that, they are entitled to relief ; for that, they are 
entitled to protection ; for that, they are entitled to the gratitude of this 
country, as much as if they had served in our recent war. If we intend 
to act properly, as the soldier grows old, as he declines in years, as he 
fades away toward the shadow-land, it is ours to see that the hand of this 
Republic shall be stretched out to him in relief. We should say to him : 
" In your manhood, in your youth, in your vigor and strength of life, 
you put forth your efforts to support an imperilled government, to save 
from wreck our free institutions ; and now, in your old age, feeble and 
dependent, we will give you this small pittance, that your path to the 
grave may be smoothed, and made pleasant, with the recollection that 
your glorious deeds are held in grateful memory by the Republic." 

LOGAN DECLINES TO RUN FOR GOVERNOR OF ILLINOIS LOGAN 

" THE CENTRE OF ATTRACTION " IN THE HOUSE AGAIN RE- 
NOMINATED REPRESENTATIVE AT LARGE AT THE CHICAGO 

CONVENTION OF 1 868, HE NOMINATES GRANT FOR PRESI- 
DENT. 

During the winter of 1867-68 Congressman Logan having 
been urged by some of his friends to accept the Republican 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 1 35 

nomination for Governor of Illinois, declined. The Rock 
Island Weekly Union, alluding to this, says: 

In a letter to a gentleman of Rock Island, he says that, while he dis- 
likes to refuse any reasonable request of his friends, he has become so 
deeply interested in the questions that must be settled by this, and 
the succeeding Congress, that he prefers to remain identified with that 
body until they are finally disposed of. He says he wants " this govern- 
ment reconstructed on a basis that will at least allow a loyal man to live 
in it." . . . While there is no doubt the people of Illinois would 
gladly choose him as their chief executive, General Logan is needed in 
Congress. His services are more valuable, to the State and Nation, in 
that position, than they could be as Governor of Illinois. Such men as 
he is — earnest and fearless in the defence of loyalty, who cannot be 
swerved from the strict performance of duty — should not be spared 
from Congress, in the present crisis. 

At this time Logan was already one of the most marked 
men in Congress. The editorial correspondence from Wash- 
ington, February 20, 1868, of a Southern Illinois paper, 
graphically describes him thus : 

This man is the centre of attraction. When he walks into the House 
of Representatives, the whisper goes the round of the galleries : "That's 
Logan of Illinois." Every eye watches him. When he rises, no matter 
how much confusion prevails at the time, order is at once restored. 
Spectators and members all turn toward him, and, while he speaks, pro- 
found silence reigns, except the sound of his own voice. When he 
leaves, he is pursued by people from every part of the country. His 
rooms are thronged by ladies and gentlemen at all hours. His influence 
is sought after by all classes of persons, and for every imaginable thing. 
These people are a heavy tax upon his time and energy, but Logan re- 
ceives all with the same freedom and ease as he is approached at home, 
and without ostentation. In a word, Logan is the same in Washington 
that he is in Egypt — bold, manly, candid, a constant worker and a faiths 
ful representative. The people of Illinois have reason to be proud of 
him. In honoring him with so important an office, the people have hon- 
ored themselves and the State. No citizen of the great State of Illinois 
need be ashamed of his Representative, nor blush when his name is called. 

Early in 1868, General Logan was again nominated by 
acclamation for Representative from the State at large, and 



136 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

also elected a delegate to the National Union Republican 
Convention of that year, which he attended at the head of the 
Illinois delegation, and, in a brief but ringing speech, put 
General Grant, his old comrade-in-arms, in nomination for 
President of the United States. 



logan's "keynote" speech in the house, 1868 — scathing 
review of the "principles of the democratic party " 
good reading for young men, even now. 

On July 16, 1868, Congressman Logan delivered a speech 
before the House of Representatives, which was so scath- 
ing a review of the "Principles of the Democratic Party" as 
enunciated in their platform and otherwise, that it created 
quite a sensation at the time, and was the keynote of the 
Presidential contest of that year, which ended in the trium- 
phant election of General Grant to the Presidency. It was an 
able review both of the war and of the public measures which 
followed it; and its historical value is sufficient reason — aside 
from the fact that much of it will probably continue to have a 
close applicability to future political campaigns — for giving it 
entire. Said Mr. Logan : 

Mr. Chairman, the Democratic platform is a " whited sepulchre, full 
of dead men's bones." It is a monument which is intended to hide de- 
cay and conceal corruption. Like many other monuments, it attracts 
attention by its vast proportions, and excites disgust by the falsity of its 
inscriptions. The casual observer, knowing nothing of the previous 
life of the deceased, who reads this eulogy upon the tomb, might im- 
agine that all the virtues, the intellect, and the genius of the age were 
buried there. But to him who knows that the life had been a living 
lie, an incessant pursuit of base ends, the stone is a mockery, and the 
panegyric a fable. 

It is my purpose to show, sir, that this Democratic platform is a 
mockery of the past, and that its promises for the future are hollow, 
evasive, and fabulous ; that it disregards the sanctities of truth, and 
deals only in the language of the juggler. It is like the words of the 




LOGAN NOMINATING GRANT.— Page 136. 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. ! 37 

weird witches who wrought a noble nature to crime and ruin, and then, 
in the hour of dire extremity, 

Kept the word of promise to the ear, 
And broke it to the hope. 

What are the pledges of this platform, made by a party which now 
asks place and power for themselves, and retirement and obscurity for 
us ? They pledge, peace to the country. Well, sir, the country should 
have peace. They pledge, a uniform and valuable currency to the 
country. Sir, the country desires such a currency. They pledge, econ- 
omy in the administration of the Government. Judicious economy is 
among the first maxims of government. They pledge, payment of the 
public debt and reduction of taxation. I agree that the public credit 
must be preserved at all hazards, and that taxation should be reduced 
by all means. They pledge, reform of all abuses. Sir, when once an 
abuse is discovered, no man will deny that it should be at once reformed. 
They pledge, the observance of the laws, the guarantees of the Consti- 
tution, the rights of the people, and the promotion of the public weal. 
Nothing more could be asked of a party than that it should do every- 
thing which is good, and abstain from all that is bad. Happy indeed, 
sir, is that country whose rulers are all wise, all virtuous, all patriots, 
and all without ambition except to excel in worth and wisdom. 

When such a party is found, Mr. Chairman, I shall support it, no 
matter by what name it may be called; but until it is found, — and I may 
be permitted to remark that it never yet has been found in history,— I 
shall support that party which does the best it can for the country, with 
what materials it has, and makes up in good deeds what it may lack in 
polished speech. 

Now, Mr. Chairman, as I am an anxious inquirer after truth, and as 
I agree that the promises of this platform are many and seemingly fair, 
and likely to catch the eye and ear of some who are unsuspecting, I 
am desirous of ascertaining the basis upon which they rest, in order 
that I may determine first how far I may trust to their performance. 
It is an inquiry that concerns not only me, but all of us ; but more par- 
ticularly does it concern those who are to come after us— the young 
men of this nation who are now about to cast their first vote, and who 
will ultimately occupy the places we now hold, and be affected for 
good or for ill by the policy we may now adopt. No man has a right 
to treat this question lightly, and when we see a convention held by an 
adverse party, it is our duty to criticise fairly but rigidly its acts, and to 
ask of what personnel is it composed ? 

If we find that its proclamations of principles are only a bait for 



!^8 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

votes ; if we find that its resolutions are inconsistent, the one with 
the other, and all contradictory of the resolutions of previous years ; 
if we find that, instead of being a party promoting the prosperity 
of the country, it is the party which attempted the life of the coun- 
try ; if we find that it is a party whose policy was suicidal in peace, and 
fratricidal in war ; if we find that it is a party which has adhered to 
no principle in times past, except the principle of perpetuity ; if we 
find that the men who now lift their voices as its leaders are unworthy 
men who bared their blades in rebellion ; if we find there, a gathering 
of all who are wildly ambitious, thoroughly unscrupulous, and danger- 
ously discontented, then we may safely say their pledges are all false, 
and we may warn not only the soldiers and sailors, but all good men, 
and particularly all young men, to avoid their snares and flee from their 
delusions. 

It requires an unusual condition of public affairs to produce such 
an unusual platform, and we require to know what that condition is, be- 
fore we can judge of it. Let us see what is the condition, and what 
produced it. A very few years ago, the Democratic Party were in 
power. They had been in power for many, many years before. What- 
ever of good there was in their policy, they had had time to develop it. 
Whatever of evil there was, they had had opportunity to correct it. 
They did neither the one thing nor the other. There were no hostile 
armies then. The people imagined that there was peace. A few, only, 
believed that there could be war. But war was imminent. Under the 
surface of peace, that party was preparing for war. In the council- 
chambers of the Nation, they howled for war. In the different de- 
partments of the Government, where they were trusted and uncon- 
trolled, they were preparing for war. In the minds of the young and 
unsuspecting, they sowed the seeds of war. In their newspapers they 
threatened war. In the lecture-room, in the college, from the pulpit 
and the rostrum, they invoked war ; and finally, when they judged the 
time had come, when the Nation was most helpless and the weapons of 
defence most useless, they made war,— and war of what kind ? Actual 
war, treasonable war, — war against those who had loved and fostered 
them, — upon co-dwellers under the same roof, and brothers by birth 
and blood. How did war find us ? It found us as the ship is found 
when pirates scuttle her — open to the mercy of the waves, and ready 
to be engulfed. 

We had made no preparation for war. The military and naval es- 
tablishments were on a peace footing, and even the skeleton had been 
disjointed. Treason was in the high places, and consternation prevailed 
everywhere else. That which might have been efficient, in a pinch, 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 



139 



had been weakened by treachery, or paralyzed by surprise. We had 
few troops, few guns, few forts, few sail, and few commanders. Scarcely 
a man in the North, out of the regular service, knew the first move- 
ments in the school of the soldier. The knowledge of arms had not 
been sought, and material and munition of war had sparsely been pro- 
vided. We had no money, to carry on a war. We had no policy de- 
clared, to carry us through a war. But war, bloody, dreadful, disrupt- 
ing, came upon us, and we had to meet it as best we could. The 
first thing was to get money. We issued the greenbacks. Whether 
that was the wisest thing to be done, is not the question. At that 
time it seemed to be the only thing we could do, and therefore we 
did it. 

But greenbacks were not sufficient. We issued the bonds of various 
kinds because we needed more money, and we had to offer security of 
some kind for it, and that seemed to be, at that time, the best that 
could be offered. Whether it was so in fact, or not, is not now the 
question. They were issued, and are not yet redeemed. Spite of all 
this, we got heavily in debt. The war was a gigantic one. Armies 
were raised, whose numbers astounded the world. Battles were fought, 
whose slaughter saddened the world. Destruction of property followed, 
whose amount might bankrupt a nation. But we were fighting for the 
life and liberties of this people, and to solve the problem of man's 
capability for self-government ; we could not stop. We were compelled 
to go on ; and debt followed us as fast and as far as we went — heavy, 
crushing, appalling debt. Laws were defied, and we compelled their 
obedience. When the civil power was too weak, we took the strong 
arm of the sword. States were insurgent, and the people threw off their 
allegiance. We took the Government from those who cast it off, and 
we gave it to those who fought to maintain it. Our debts were falling 
due, and we taxed the people to pay them. The taxes were heavy ; but 
the debts were heavy ; and the army expenses were enormous. 

In so far as we could, we struggled to keep down our debt and to 
keep up our credit. What else ? We found slavery had been a cause 
of war ; but we found also that war abolished slavery. What next ? 
We found those who had been slaves, were true ; and those who should 
have been true, were false. We gave the slave a musket, because we 
found he was a man ; and we gave him a ballot, that he might be a citi- 
zen. And so, sir, under these disabilities, and against all these disad- 
vantages, we fought out that fight. We subdued the rebellion, — we 
ended the war. And then, Mr. Chairman, what was the condition of 
affairs ? We found the South exhausted, impoverished, and starved. 
We found her white male population fearfully thinned by battle ; her 



I4 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

black laboring population freed, but without opportunity to labor, and 
no resources for a livelihood. 

Everything was dark, gloomy, and dismal. There was no money, no 
commerce, no traffic there. The races were embittered against each 
other, the whites threatened to exterminate the blacks. We gave ra- 
tions to the whites, and the Freedmen's Bureau as protection to the 
blacks. We afforded opportunities for employment ; and we regulated 
the relations of the employer and the laborer. We protected the one, 
and we encouraged the other. And when we could not keep the peace 
by the civil arm, we resorted to the military, because we have had 
enough of war, and we determined that the peace should be kept. What 
next ? We found that there were no governments in the rebel States 
which we could recognize ; and we provided plain and merciful means 
by which new governments could be established. 

This was the condition of the South. How was it in the North ? 
We were oppressed with our debt ; we were borne down with our taxes; 
we were perplexed how to pay the first, and how to reduce the latter. 
But our hearts were all glad notwithstanding, because we had saved our 
country. We mourned for those we had lost, but we rejoiced for those 
who were to come, for we had solved the problem of liberty and the 
destiny of our people. We set ourselves immediately to repair the 
ravages of the war. At the close of the war, by the official report of 
the Secretary of the Treasury, dated December 3, 1866, our indebted- 
ness on the 31st day of August, 1865, was $2,846,021,742.04 ; on the 
1st day of June, 1868, by the report of the same official, our indebted- 
ness was $2,510,245,886.74, being a reduction of the national debt since 
August 31, 1865, to June 1, 1868, of $335>775> 8 55-3°> showing a reduc- 
tion of our national debt, of one hundred millions per annum. Under 
a Republican Congress, could we have had an Executive and Cabinet 
in harmony with Congress, so that frauds and robberies of the revenues 
could have been stopped, in my judgment the whole country would be 
at peace, and our debt reduced at least $500,000,000. We now propose 
to reduce the army and navy, as rapidly as can be done with safety to 
the country, and all other expenses of the Government. We have also, 
as fast as State after State organizes its government, abolished military 
authority and subordinated it to the civil, and abolished the Freedmen's 
Bureau, to take effect the 1st of next January. 

This, Mr. Chairman, is a brief statement of the condition of our coun- 
try since i860. I have been brief in stating, because I did not wish to 
tell an oft-told tale. I have only sketched those events which have 
given rise to the pledges and complaints of the Democratic platform. 
Now, sir, when a nation finds itself thus suddenly engaged in an un- 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 



141 



foreseen war, and thus unexpectedly is called upon for all its resources, 
and emerges from the struggle victorious but fatigued, strong but 
wearied, it is certainly entitled to some forbearance, and its supporters 
should meet with some encouragement and praise. This remark brings 
me to my first allegation against this platform. I allege against it, that 
it makes a specious and a false complaint against us for doing the only 
thing which it was in our power to do, and the only thing which any 
other party. Republican or Democratic, could have done, unless they 
made an ignominious peace with the rebels ! No other set of men, be 
their politics what they might, could have done aught other than we did 
do, if they were patriots and fought the battle of their country ! I allege 
against it, also, that the very men who now make this complaint were 
either the identical men, or else the partisan friends and adherents of 
the identical men, who brought on this war, who fought the flag, who 
caused the debt, and who were the immediate occasion of all our sor- 
row and of all our burdens ! 

It is not true, then, that the Democratic Party will give peace to the 
country. They have been the party of war, and, by the written declar- 
ations of their candidate for Vice-President, they propose more war un- 
less they can undo all the victory we have achieved, and renew rebell-. 
ion where we have quieted it. I read, Mr. Chairman, a letter written 
by Major-General F. P. Blair to Colonel Broadhead of St. Louis : 

" Washington, June 30, 1868. 

" Dear Colonel : In reply to your inquiries I beg leave to say that 
I leave to you to determine, on consultation with my friends from Mis- 
souri, whether my name shall be presented to the Democratic Conven- 
tion, and to submit the following as what I consider the real and only 
issue in this contest : 

" The reconstruction policy of the Radicals will be complete before 
the next election ; the States so long excluded will have been admitted, 
negro suffrage established, and the carpet-baggers installed in their 
seats in both branches of Congress. There is no possibility of chang- 
ing the political character of the Senate, even if the Democrats should 
elect their President and a majority of the popular branch of Congress. 
We cannot, therefore, undo the Radical plan of reconstruction by Con- 
gressional action ; the Senate will continue a bar to its repeal. Must we 
submit to it ? How can it be overthrown ? It can only be overthrown 
by the authority of the Executive, who is sworn to maintain the Consti- 
tution, and who will fail to do his duty if he allows the Constitution to 
perish under a series of Congressional enactments which are in palpable 
violation of its fundamental principles. 



I4 2 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

If the President elected by the Democracy enforces, or permits 
others to enforce, these reconstruction acts, the Radicals, by the acces- 
sion of twenty spurious Senators and fifty Representatives, will control, 
both branches of Congress, and his Administration will be as powerless 
as the present one of Mr. Johnson. 

"There is but one way to restore the Government and the Constitu- 
tion, and that is for the President-elect to declare these acts null and 
void, compel the army to undo its usurpations at the South, disperse 
the carpet-bag State governments, allow the white people to reorganize 
their own governments, and elect Senators and Representatives. The 
House of Representatives will contain a majority of Democrats from 
the North, and they will admit the Representatives elected by the white 
people of the South, and with the co-operation of the President it will 
not be difficult to compel the Senate to submit once more to the obli- 
gations of the Constitution. It will not be able to withstand the public 
judgment, if distinctly invoked and clearly expressed on this funda- 
mental issue, and it is the sure way to avoid all future strife to put the 
issue plainly to the country. 

" I repeat that this is the real and only question which we should 
iHo'.v to control us : Shall we submit to the usurpations by which the 
Government has been overthrown, or shall we exert ourselves for its 
full and complete restoration ? It is idle to talk of bonds, greenbacks, 
gold, the public faith, and the public credit. What can a Democratic 
President do in regard to any of these, with a Congress in both branches 
controlled by the carpet-baggers and their allies ? He will be powerless 
to stop the supplies by which idle negroes are organized into political 
clubs — by which an army is maintained to protect these vagabonds in 
their outrages upon the ballot. These, and things like these, eat up 
the revenue and resources of the Government and destroy its credit — 
make the difference between gold and greenbacks. We must restore 
the Constitution before we can restore the finances, and to do this we 
must have a President who will execute the will of the people by tram- 
pling into dust the usurpation of Congress known as the reconstruction 
acts. I wish to stand before the Convention upon this issue, but it is 
one that embraces everything else that is of value in its large and com- 
prehensive results. It is the one thing that includes all that is worth a 
contest, and without it there is nothing that gives dignity, honor, or 
value to the struggle. 

"Your friend, 

Frank P. Blair. 

" Colonel James O. Broadhead" 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 143 

Is this the language of peace ? Is this the pledge of security to the 
country? Is this the return to the settled pursuits of civil life and the 
calm routine of trade, which shall reassure our people and restore our 
prosperity ? Does it not rather suggest the clarion-trump and the clash 
of arms— the neigh of steed and the shriek of death ? Are our taxes to 
be lessened under these threats ? Will our credit be made better by 
these means ? Gentlemen shall not tell me that this is not an utterance 
of the party, nor a binding declaration. The letter was written before 
the Convention met, in view of its meeting, and in order to bring the 
writer and his doctrines before that Convention as a candidate. Both 
ends were attained. The letter was published ; the writer was nominat- 
ed. The doctrines are his and his party's, and are embodied in the 
platform by the declaration that " we regard the reconstruction acts (so 
called) as usurpations, and unconstitutional, revolutionary, and void." 
It seems, then, from this, that all we have done is to be undone. No 
matter that the voice of the country, in election after election, year after 
year, has sanctioned it and said it was well done ; the Democratic Party 
says it must be undone, or that the swords shall be unsheathed and des- 
olation sweep over the land. 

Where, now, are the pledges of specie payment, of redeemed bonds, 
of equal currency, of wise legislation, of amicable feeling, of restored 
confidence, of judicious economy and reduced taxation ? Gone ! gone ! 
The loud note of insurrection has dispelled them all, and the possibility 
of our national parliament being dissolved by the sword, as in Crom- 
well's day, has put all lingering hope to flight. We are promised a uni- 
form and valuable currency — one currency — which is to be sufficient 
"for the Government and the people, the laborer and the office-holder, 
the pensioner and the soldier, the producer and the bondholder." We 
are promised "payment of the public debt as rapidly as practicable." 
We are notified of "equal taxation of every species of property, includ- 
ing bonds and other securities." We are to expect " economy in the 
administration of the Government," and the " abolition of the Freed- 
men's Bureau." How is all this to be brought about ? For fear I may 
do injustice to the platform, I wish to quote some extracts from the 
World newspaper of July 8th, the day after the platform was made. I 
may add that the World is the authoritative exponent of the views of 
the distinguished gentleman, Horatio Seymour, who has been nominated 
for President by that party, and therefore this interpretation is his in- 
terpretation. 

" The declarations relating to the finances are scattered through dif- 
ferent sections of the platform. They need to be brought together 
before we can get an intelligent view of their scope. The platform is 



i 4 4 LTFE 0F LOGAN. 

explicit enough upon each particular point, but its several declarations 
so limit and modify one another that it would be very misleading to 
consider any one of them apart from the rest." 

It is somewhat singular, if this document were all fairness and hon- 
esty, that its different subjects could not be put close enough together 
to afford an "intelligent view" of each, and that "its declarations are so 
misleading" as to require an expert like the World to bring them to- 
gether in harmony. Why is it that "its several declarations limit and 
modify one another," if these are the declarations and the principles 
upon which our people are asked to stake their happiness? 

But, says the World, this is what it means : 

" Payment of the principal of the five-twenty bonds in greenbacks 
will easily be found in the platform if searched for. The language is 
that 'when the obligations of the Government do not expressly state upon 
their face, or the law under which they were issued does not provide, that 
they shall be paid in coin, they ought in right and in justice to be paid in 
the lawful money of the United States ; that is to say, in greenbacks. 
This is explicit enough so far as it relates to the medium of payment ; but 
how does the platform propose to provide the means ? In other words, 
where are the greenbacks to come from ? On this also the platform is 
explicit. They are not to be manufactured by the printing press, but 
to be raised by taxation. By this method the payment of the public 
debt cannot be very rapid. The bondholders need have no fear that 
their property is to be swept away by a new inundation of paper money. 
Payment of the public debt in greenbacks without increasing their 
present amount, payment in greenbacks out of the proceeds of a reduced 
taxation, will leave the greater portion of the debt standing for many 
years to come." 

Two things appear from this : first, that the payment of the public 
debt cannot be very rapid ; and second, that the greenbacks wherewith 
to pay it arc to be raised by taxation. This is a novel way indeed to 
"equalize the currency" and to "reduce taxation." We are to be taxed 
additionally to pay the public debt, and to be taxed a long time to come 
before it can be discharged, and the Democracy call this " reform of 
an existing abuse." There is another fact concealed in this statement 
which it were well to bring to light. We have heard that much of our 
miseries are due to the " bloated bondholders." They are lepers who 
have infected us in our persons, and tainted our financial atmosphere. 
But they are assured, by this platform, that "they need have no fears 
that their property is to be swept away by a new inundation of paper 
money." 

If these bonds are vile as they say, why should they not be swept 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 145 

away under a Democratic dispensation ? We do not think they are ; 
but, if we are to rely on Democratic testimony, they are the gangrene 
of our body politic. Again, if there is to be no " new inundation of 
paper money," how are the greenbacks to be raised which, levied in 
taxation, are to pay off the national debt ? First, it is said, they will 
raise greenbacks by taxation and pay off the bonds. It must be ad- 
mitted that the greenbacks already in circulation are not adequate for 
this, and so more must be issued. But, next it is said, that there will 
be no more issued. Then how are the bonds to be paid ? It may be 
that this is all clear to other eyes, and that the end will certainly be 
reached by the means ; but I trust I may be pardoned if I confess at once 
that I am not able to take that " intelligent view " which shows me how it 
is to be done. It seems, too, that the World has the same opacity as my- 
self, if its vision is confined to this point, and so it takes another stretch : 
"There is another part of the platform which has a pertinent bearing 
on this subject. It is the declaration in favor of 'one currency for the 
Government and the people, for the bondholder and the producer.' 
Now, although nothing is expressly said upon that point, we suppose 
the platform contemplates the payment of the duties on imports in coin 
as heretofore. This seems to us a justifiable, nay, an inevitable infer- 
ence from what is said about paying in coin such obligations of the 
Government as stipulate for coin upon their face. The interest upon 
both the ten-forty and the five-twenty bonds is payable in coin by the very 
terms of the law, and also the principal of the ten-forties. If the Gov- 
ernment keeps this express engagement, it must by some means raise 
the coin, and no other method is suggested than by collecting it, as 
now, at the custom-houses. Now, as the platform pledges the party to 
pay specie to the bondholders to meet their interest and that part of 
their principal which the law requires to be paid in coin, it seems evi- 
dent that the ' one currency for the Government and the people, the 
bondholder and the producer,' must contemplate an early return to 
specie payments. The 'one currency' must mean either a uniform 
good currency or a uniform bad currency. It is inconceivable in itself 
and inconsistent with the platform that the old, hard-money Demo- 
cratic Party should promise a uniform currency of bad money. The 
one currency means a sound currency ; a currency equivalent to coin 
and at all times exchangeable for it. One currency of depreciated 
greenbacks would be inconsistent with the payment in coin of that 
part of the public obligations which are acknowledged by the platform 
to be due in coin ; inconsistent with the collection of the revenue from 
imports in gold ; inconsistent with the idea that we are ever to return 
to specie payments." 



146 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

"Another declaration, in still another section of the platform, 
evinces an intention to make an early return to specie payments. 
After calling for a reduction of the public expenses and a reform of the 
system of taxation, the platform proceeds thus : ' So that the burden of 
taxation may be equalized and lessened, the credit of the Government 
and the currency made good.' The credit of the Government is not 
'good' so long as its promises sell for less than their face ; the currency 
is not 'good' so long as it is inflated and irredeemable." 

" The platform proposes to pay the five-twenties in greenbacks ; 
proposes to raise the money for this purpose by taxation ; promises un- 
equivocally that ' the burden of taxation shall be lessened ; the credit of 
the government made good ; the currency made good ; and that the 
good currency shall be the same for all classes, including the bond- 
holders.' We do not regard these several declarations as contradictory, 
but as mutually explanatory, perfectly consistent, and harmonious. 
The Democratic Party is pledged by the platform to appreciate the 
greenbacks to par, and use them for the payment of that part of the 
public debt which is not by express provision of law due in coin." 

Now, having got all the light of which the subject is capable, let 
us see exactly what it is that is promised by these reformers. They 
say to the people : "The bloated bondholder is eating out your sub- 
stance, and we will tax his property just as we tax yours." They say 
to the bondholder: "Have no fears for your bonds; we will issue 
no more greenbacks to depreciate them ; and we will pay them in a 
good and lawful currency. If it is not gold, it shall be as good as 
gold." They say to the people : "We will reduce your taxes." They 
say to the capitalist : " We will pay our debts by taxation." They say to 
the people : "We will have but one currency for all alike, and that shall 
be greenbacks." They say to the creditor: "We will pay you in gold, 
as the law requires ; but we will make the greenback of the value of gold 
if we can." And then they say to all, to the bondholder and the 
people, the pensioner and the soldier, the laborer, the office-holder, 
and the producer: "We will reform all abuses; we will equalize taxa- 
tion by a uniform currency ; we will pay the bonds in gold, or green- 
backs at par ; and we will pay off our debts." When ? After many 
years to come ! 

So, Mr. Chairman, admitting that all this is to be brought about in 
the very letter and spirit of the promise, it appears that the first con- 
dition of its fulfilment is that the Democratic Party shall have unlim- 
ited power for many years to come, or else it cannot keep its word. If 
it should be asked what recourse or remedy will the people have if, 
after having given that power to that party for many years to come, 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 



147 



those promises should not be kept, these pledges should not be fulfilled, 
I am at a loss to reply ; I do not find any remedy stated in the platform ; 
I am not aware of any recourse. Still, however, it may be impertinent 
and useless to make the inquiry or to seek for redress. A ruined debt- 
or, bankrupt to the last farthing, need trouble himself but very little as 
to the disposition of the assets which he has not got. This, then, sir, is 
the much-vaunted financial policy which is to be inaugurated by the 
Democratic Party, and through which this country is to be rescued 
from all her present difficulties. This is the key-note of their complaint 
and the battle-cry of their campaign. It is a platform which was made 
to suit a candidate who was defeated for the nomination. The platform 
was made for one man, but that man is not the one who is standing on 
it. The man who wanted that platform did not get the nomination, 
and the man who did get the nomination did not want that platform. 
It is not of record that, like another memorable candidate of by-gone 
years, "he spat upon it." Indeed, his well-known habits of decorum 
and aristocratic breeding forbid the possibility of such a thing. But it 
is of record that he made two earnest and powerful speeches to prevent 
the enunciation of a doctrine which he knew was absurd in the present 
and would be falsified in the future. If, then, their financial declara- 
tions are vague and false, how can we trust aught else they say? The 
country wants peace ; through peace will come prosperity. Prosperity 
thrives under a government of fixed principles, and principles are most 
firmly fixed when they are most generally and best understood by the 
people at large. If their finances fail, all else fails. Now, what do they 
say upon another most essential and remunerative branch of the na- 
tional finances, — that branch which is now, and must continue to be, the 
only gold-yielding portion of our revenue, — I mean the tariff? I quote 
again, sir, from the World : 

"There is only one other subject embraced in the platform which 
seems to call for any remark, and that is the tariff, or ' protection.' This 
part of the platform is a muddle. The language is a ' tariff for revenue 
upon foreign imports,' which is good, sound Democratic doctrine, but it 
is immediately followed by this unintelligible jumble : 'and such equal 
taxation under the internal-revenue laws as will afford incidental pro- 
tection to domestic manufactures.' We are here treated to the paradox 
of a revenue tariff, and protective internal taxes. But the wonder does 
not end here. A protective tariff discriminates, but internal taxes are 
to protect without discriminating. It is 'equal ' internal taxes that are 
to accomplish the feat of protecting domestic manufactures. If all in- 
terests are taxed alike, how can any be protected ? What are they to 
be protected against ? Not against foreign rivals by internal taxes ; not 



148 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



against domestic competition by equal taxes. The promise of 'a tariff 
for revenue ' is excellent ; all beyond that is nonsense." 

You will observe, Mr. Chairman, that it is not I who say that this 
is a muddle, an unintelligible jumble, a paradox, and nonsense, but the 
leading Seymour paper in the United States. 

I turn now to another topic, and still I quote the World: 

" All that the Democratic Party promise to do, in relation to negro 
supremacy, is comprised in these words : 'The reduction of the stand- 
ing army and navy, the abolition of the Freedmen's Bureau, and all 
political instrumentalities designed, to secure negro supremacy.' The 
Freedmen's Bureau, with the army to back it, is a tremendous election- 
eering machine intended to control the negro vote. When it is abol- 
ished, the negro vote will fall under the control of the white citizens of 
the South, and there will then be no difficulty in carrying all the South- 
ern States for the Democratic Party." 

That is, the Freedmen's Bureau is an outrageous institution, because 
it prevents the Democratic Party from controlling the negro vote, and 
getting supremacy in every Southern State ; that is to say, the Freed- 
men's Bureau would be all right if it were in Democratic hands, and 
the negro will be a good enough man to vote so soon as he can be got 
to vote the Democratic ticket. The World further adds : 

" The platform promises to smash the political machine called the 
Freedmen's Bureau and all other Federal agencies for controlling the 
Southern elections ; but beyond this it wisely promises nothing in re- 
lation to negro suffrage. It promises that the Federal Government 
shall not interfere to cajole the negroes into voting against the interests 
of their section, and trusts to the natural ascendency of white intelli- 
gence to accomplish whatever else may be deemed expedient. In this 
matter the platform is equally wise in what it promises and in what it 
abstains from promising." 

In other words, it is admirable because it is so happy in suppressing 
the truth to an extent as great as in suggesting a falsehood ; and this, 
sir, is the whole of it beyond the usual quantity of empty phrases, "full 
of sound and fury and signifying nothing," with which, from time im- 
memorial, the Democratic Party have been in the habit of garnishing 
their platforms. I might make a closer analysis of it all, and I think I 
might make a stronger show of its utter worthlessness ; but I am con- 
tent to accept the rendition of the World, in order that I may not be 
charged with partisan prejudice. I take the World, because it is the 
word. 

It explains the deed, for him who is to perform it ; and surely, where 
we decide evidence of intention and of faith, we can ask for nothing 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 1 49 

stronger than the word and the deed combined. But I have not done 
yet. I desire, with your indulgence, to go a little behind the promise, 
to inquire as to the character of those who make the promise. It is an 
axiom, with all business men, that the value of a note is determined not 
at all by what it promises to pay, but wholly and exclusively by the 
character of the makers and indorsers. I wish to inquire, Mr. Chair- 
man, who are the men that made up that Democratic Convention, and 
who are the men that indorsed its candidates ? I have already referred 
to the men who, in time of peace, plotted war. I have shown how it 
was that this country became charged with its load of debt. I have 
dwelt upon the struggles and the difficulties of that hour, and the wails 
and the woes of our mourners. I have stated how we did all that we 
did, because it was the only thing to do. I have shown how we wrestled 
with our adversity, and finally how we overcame our enemies. We bore 
the brunt of arms, for the sake of our country, and to uphold its consti- 
tution, its laws, and its liberties. We had but one desire, and that was 
" Peace to our country." We had but one anxiety, and that was to pre- 
serve intact this chosen land. Well, sir, as I said, the war was over, and 
the victory was ours. There was no longer a rebel in arms. They had 
dispersed, as we supposed, never to meet again. 

But, sir, we were mistaken. They have met again. Where ? Why, 
this time upon Northern soil and in a Northern city — in the city of New 
York, the great metropolis of this country — in the Democratic Conven- 
tion. I do not say that every man who met there had been a rebel ; 
but I do say that all the rebels met there, who are now leading in pub- 
lic life, and who hope for public position. It was the same old story 
over again ; the same old faces to see. The men who had held this 
Government for years, and plotted to destroy it while they held it, were 
there. The men who fought to destroy this Government when they 
could no longer hold it, were there. The men who, though they had 
never plotted to destroy it or fought against it, yet quietly acquiesced 
in the designs of those who did, were there. The men who have always 
given blind allegiance to the behest of party, regardless of the good of 
the country, were there. The men who have always been the praters 
and croakers and false prophets of the country, were there ; and a few 
men who had once served their country, but were lured off by fatal am- 
bition and the hope of spoils, were there. Good men may have been there, 
but bad men were most certainly there ; and just as certainly the bad 
outnumbered the good. And these are the men, sir, who complain of us. 
These are the men who say we have violated the law, and have usurped 
the Constitution. We have told them to the contrary, many and many 
a time. In these very halls, before they deserted their places, we as- 



150 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

sured them that we desired nothing but the law and the Constitution. 
After they had erected their first batteries, and before they fired on Fort 
Sumter, they were again assured that the law and the Constitution 
should be kept inviolate. Even after they had waged their fiercest war 
upon us, the President of the United States once more proclaimed that 
we fought, only, to protect the Constitution and the laws. 

Again and again, by the camp-fire, under the flag of truce and in 
the hospitals, and in exchange of prisoners, and in parleys and com- 
munications, they were made acquainted with the fact that we had but 
one object, and that was to enforce the Constitution and the laws. And 
yet again, sir, when the battle was at a white heat, and strong arms and 
strong hearts wrought wounds and death, when the air was filled with 
lamentations and pierced by cries of agony, when the greedy earth 
drank up the gushing blood of our bravest and our best, we still ad- 
vanced but the one standard, which was the old starry banner, emblem- 
atic of the Constitution, the laws, our unity, and strength. Ah, sir, it 
must have been a humiliating scene at that Convention ! Were the 
loyal soldiers and_ citizens of this country looking on, when the rebel 
General Preston nominated the former Union General Blair ? Did the 
loyal sailors and soldiers hear the rebel Wade Hampton second the 
nomination ! Did the rank and file of the loyal men listen to the 
butcher of Fort Pillow — Forrest ? Where were then the memories of 
former treacheries, of a nation outdone and a Constitution usurped, of 
laws violated and civil slaughter instituted? 

I have no desire to keep alive old animosities, or to recall the past 
with a view to let it rankle. I am willing that the lessons of the war 
should be their own monitor to those who learned them. But when I 
hear those who risked their lives to save our country ; when I hear those 
whose shorn limbs and maimed trunks are witnesses of their devotion 
to the laws, charged with breaking the laws ; when I hear those who 
are now lying in their premature graves for the cause of the Constitu- 
tion, charged with usurping that Constitution, — I cannot help it if my 
indignant heart beats fast and my utterance grows thick, while I de- 
mand to know "Who are ye that denounce us ?" 

It is for this reason, Mr. Chairman, that I say the present issue is 
one which concerns our young men greatly, because it contains the 
question, whether, in any future war, it is worth while for our young 
men to embark in it. Heretofore it has always been held, in all ages, 
ancient and modern, that he who defended his country, was entitled to 
the gratitude of his country. But if it shall be decided, by this election, 
that lie who defends his country, is to be aspersed by his country, then 
the sooner it is understood, the better it will be for those who would 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 



151 



have otherwise perilled their existence at the call of their people. That 
issue is involved in this campaign, and no artifice or chicanery should be 
permitted to bury it out of sight. But what right have those, to com- 
plain, who were in the Democratic Convention, but yet were not in the 
rebel ranks ? Did they aid us to suppress the rebellion ? Were they 
prompt with men and money in our need ? Were they hopeful in our 
dark days, and joyful in our bright days ? Did they cheer our soldiers 
and give them the strength of their blessings and a God-speed ? Did 
they nurse them when sick, and succor them when wounded? No, sir; 
they did not, or else they would not be found to-day in such company. 
The civilian who supported the military in the day of the war, has never 
yet complained that we have done great wrong, nor ever yet desired to 
take the reins of government from the Republican Party. 

This is no schism in our own ranks. This is no falling off of those 
who once were with us, because of our misdeeds. This is no branch of 
the Union party, saying that we are tyrants and usurpers and robbers 
and destroyers, and that therefore they can support us no longer. Not 
at all. It is simply our old enemies who have fought us in the Halls of 
Congress, and on the battle-field, and in campaigns, for years ; never 
winning, ever failing, but always fierce and hateful. 

It affords me sincere pleasure that I may look again upon those who 
met so lately in convention at the city of Chicago. What a sight was 
there ! Mr. Chairman, there were gathered together the men who had 
served their country in every capacity to which duty called them. The 
men whose devotion had been as unswerving as their fidelity was un- 
questioned. Men whose sole thoughts and whose constant thoughts 
were for their country's good, and how best and soonest to make it 
manifest and permanent. Men from the closet, men from the camp, 
men from the public station, men from private life, men of distinction, 
men unknown ; but all of them, whithersoever they came and whatso- 
ever they were, all of them men who came on the one thought of how 
yet to aid their country. 

Whom did they select, and how were they selected ? Not after days 
of balloting, and nights of intrigue ; not upon bargains by politicians, 
and tradings by tricksters; not upon appliances of questionable moral- 
ity, and through stimulants of debasing tendency. In a moment, as it 
were, and by one spontaneous accord, the hearts of all these men came 
together, and their judgments approved their instincts. With one un- 
faltering acclaim, they selected the hero whose valor had been resplen- 
dent in the field, and the statesman whose wisdom had been acknowl- 
edged in Congress. The popular judgment is seldom wrong, but never 
was it so right as when it asked that this Government should be put in 



152 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

the hands of Grant and Colfax. They had seen Grant clothed with the 
powers of a dictator, and seen him use them with the moderation of a 
patriot. They had seen him at the head of an irresistible army, and had 
seen him disband it as from a dress parade. They had watched him 
achieve victory after victory, and yet quietly put off all the shows and 
trappings of war. They had found him sagacious as a counsellor, and 
safe as a chieftain. He had proved himself to be honest, and they knew 
he could be trusted. 

Sir, on that day three hundred thousand sainted martyrs to the cause 
of liberty, for whom the earth had bared her bosom to receive their 
manly forms, and heaven opened wide her gates to receive their noble 
spirits, looked down approvingly upon our action, because it was the 
action of true and faithful men, intending the honor, prosperity, and 
happiness of their country. 

I have no doubt, sir, of their election. To doubt it would be to im- 
pugn the judgment of my countrymen. The country demands that the 
political power for that " many years to come," desired by the Demo- 
crats, shall be intrusted to the Republican Party. The people have 
faith in the Republican Party. They judge it by what it has done, and 
hence they know, full well, what it will do. They know that the Repub- 
lican Party is, in fact, the only party of peace and prosperity. It was 
that party which led the hosts of the Union, to the haven of peace, 
through the red ordeal of war. These questions, which now embarrass 
us, are but the debris of war. We have cared for the wounded, we have 
buried the dead. We have disbanded our armies, as part of the work 
remaining after the war. To give stability to the currency, to equalize 
taxation, to harmonize States, and to insure prosperity, is still another 
and probably quite as difficult a portion of that same labor. But the 
party which did the one, is unquestionably equal to the other. 

I am not an enthusiast, when obstacles are to be overcome, and when 
intricate questions are to be solved. I do not wish, therefore, to be 
called visionary, or enthusiastic, when I predict the results which will 
certainly follow from the administration of the Republican Party in 
four years more. We will see, sir, then, the admirable results of having 
all the different departments of the Government acting in entire unison 
and accord. Heretofore, during the eight years that our party has been 
in power, we have had to give four of them to stay the tide of rebellion, 
and the rest have been rendered nearly useless to us by the obstinacy, 
the perversion, and the machinations of a designing executive. When 
we marched into the field, our foe was before us. We knew what we 
had to meet. There were no surprises in store for us. It was the dread 
arbitrament of battle. But after that, we had another foe to meet — a 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 1 53 

dangerous foe, powerful, and insidious ; one whose assaults were made, 
in the garb of peace, and under the pretexts of law ; one who sought to 
check every step of our progress, and retard every advance of our 
civilization. Our time has been occupied in detecting the hidden am- 
bushes of this enemy, and saving ourselves from his surprises. But 
soon he will pass away. 

Like the armed foe whose accessory he was, he will disappear from 
the public gaze, and become impotent for further harm. With the Ex- 
ecutive to encourage the Congress, and with a Congress which will 
respect and hearken to the Executive, then, indeed, the fruits of our 
legislation will be visible, and gratifying. Commerce will revive, for 
the country will have stability. Our ships shall once again multiply 
upon the seas, for our flag will denote security. Our name shall be 
respected abroad, for we shall have demonstrated the doctrine of self- 
government. Our bonds will be sought for investment, for we shall 
have vindicated our integrity. Our currency shall be unsuspected at 
home, for we shall have proved its value. Our revenue shall be in- 
creased, for the country will have become inspired with confidence. Bad 
men will be hurled from power, and honest ones put in their places. 
Our taxes shall be diminished, for all will unite in yielding them. The 
Southern States will be reorganized and recognized, for they will have 
seen that therein lies their welfare. 

We will go on, sir, as a Nation, hand-in-hand, treading the broad 
pathway which leads up to prosperity and progress, with our march 
unimpeded by the difficulties which now surround us, and posterity 
shall bless our work, unceasingly, forever. 

LOGAN IN THE CAMPAIGN OF 1 868 WHAT WAS THOUGHT AND 

SAID OF HIS EFFORTS HIS GREAT SPEECHES AT POUGHKEEP- 

SIE, N. Y., AND MORRIS, ILL. 

During the Presidential contest which followed, Mr. 
Logan was untiringly active, making many speeches, in 
other States, as well as his own, which were acknowledged 
to be among the most powerful of that campaign. Of one 
of them, the New York City special correspondence of the 
Chicago Evening Journal, August 18th, said: 

General Logan's speech at Poughkeepsie on Friday evening is 
winning golden opinions for him. Several of our papers reproduce it 
entire, while all the Republican sheets copy more or less of it. Many 



I54 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

pronounce it the very best campaign speech yet delivered, while others 
rank it among the very best, classifying it with the one just delivered 
by Matthew H. Carpenter in your city. ... I never heard General 
Logan but once, at the Cooper Institute in 1865, when the ovation, ir- 
respective of party, was extended to him, Grant, and Blair. I sat beside 
him on the stage, and as I watched the effect of his remarks on the vast 
assemblage, how he seemed to lead them captive at his will, it seemed 
to me that he must be one of the very best campaign speakers in the 
country. We are very thankful for his services here, in New York, to 
assist us in overcoming the fifty thousand majority under which the Em- 
pire State now staggers. 

Another great speech, delivered September 1, 1868, at 
Morris, 111., which fairly discussed the claims of both parties 
to the support of the people, refuted the charge of Republi- 
can extravagance, riddled the Democratic ideas of finan- 
ceering, defended the Republican reconstruction policy, and 
exhibited the criminal folly of permitting the Democrats to 
undo all that the armies of the Union and the Republican 
party had done, — covering twelve columns of the Chicago 
Republican, — was not alone a thoroughly exhaustive and 
compendious review of the political situation, but one of the 
most remarkable efforts ever made in this country upon the 
stump. The following extract from it, touching Republican 
good faith and Democratic repudiation, is interesting as a 
sample of General Logan's stump-speech style : 

Now, my fellow-citizens, I want to add, inasmuch as I am upon this 
subject of expense, that our debt being $2,510,000,000 and a little over, 
we, the Republican Party, propose to pay that debt. [Cheers and great 
applause.] That is to say, if we control the Government, we propose 
that that debt shall be paid. [Renewed applause.] And not only paid, 
but we also propose that the Democrats and rebels, or rebels and Dem- 
ocrats [applause], shall help pay it. [Tremendous enthusiasm.] Yes, 
we propose that. [Loud applause.] 

Now how do we intend to do that ? I differ with the Democracy in 
this country. I am not in a hurry to pay this ; and I will give you my 
reasons for saying and feeling so. Our proposition is to liquidate this 
debt in twenty-five, thirty or forty years. And why do we propose to 
do that ? Because in that length of time, owing now $2,510,000,000,— 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 1 55 

if we reduce the public debt as rapidly as we have within the last two 
years, — how long will it take to pay it, reducing taxation at the same 
time ? Why we shall cancel it, in twenty-five years ; at the same time 
— mind that ! — at the same time doing away with taxation almost en- 
tirely. We will pay it in twenty-five years without our feeling it, by a 
tariff that will not be oppressive to the people, and by a light income- 
tax, together with a tax upon the luxuries of life. That is the policy of 
the Republican Party. [Great applause and long cheering.] 

We proposed, this last Congress, to fund this debt, and to fund it so 
that the interest would only be four, to four and a half, percent., instead 
of five and six per cent. But Mr. Johnson stuck the bill in his pocket, 
and it didn't become a law. But, according to the platform of the Re- 
publican Convention, we make the proposition to reduce the interest 
on the public debt, and thereby lighten the burthens of the people. 
And we propose to do it, not by passing a law that a man shall take this 
thing for that, but to do it in such a way that it will cause the bond- 
holders to exchange the one bond for the other, by letting that other 
run a time at a lower rate of interest, as is the policy of England and 
other European powers, because the great capitalists prefer a bond run- 
ning thirty or forty years, instead of say ten, as it saves them the trouble 
of reinvesting the money. And for that reason a bond running for 
a long term of years, is better than one running for a short term, and 
can be put upon the market at a lower rate of interest. 

This is our plan of paying the public debt. The Democratic Party 
propose to pay it differently. I do not agree with them, as I remarked, 
in their proposition. They say they are in favor of paying it within five 
years. They want it paid right off. They say, " You are paying six 
per cent, interest on this great debt all the time." That is true, or the 
most of it. You pay six per cent, on about $1,600,000,000, and five per 
cent, on the balance — that is, at the rate of six per cent, on the 5-20's 
and five per cent, on the 10-40's, in gold. They say that while we are 
paying that interest, they want to stop that interest. How do they 
propose to stop that interest ? It's the easiest thing in the world 
to do, the way they propose to do it. [Laughter.] They say they 
want to stop this interest, by issuing greenbacks to pay off this 
debt, and they have a stump speech on that point that is calculated to 
deceive a great many ignorant people. It won't deceive any man of 
ordinary sense and information, but it may deceive a man who is desti- 
tute of that article which is very necessary in a country where a man 
should understand his business and the affairs of the Nation. [Laugh- 
ter and applause.] 

We have now $700,000,000 of currency. Over $350,000,000 of it is 



156 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



in United States Treasury notes, and the balance, in National Bank 
notes. They say, they propose to pay off the interest of these notes— 
the National Bank bonds that are deposited as collaterals, and all the 
bonds in the hands of the bondholders— because they are mad at the 
bondholder. They don't like him. They say he is a rich man and an 
aristocrat, and they want him paid off ; they want to lift the burthens 
off the shoulders of the people. They are going to issue, besides the 
$700,000,000 of currency we now have, a fresh lot. 

Now suppose you for a short time examine this question as sensible 
men. Suppose we issue "greenbacks" to pay off these bonds and stop 
the interest, how much do you make by that ? They say currency is good 
enough for the bondholder. But "that ain't the question." The ques- 
tion is, How does it affect the people ? You are the men to be con- 
sidered. The money goes into your hands. It is issued by the Gov- 
ernment, and the bondholder gets it for his bonds, but he pays it 
directly over to you. He buys your horses, your cattle, your land, your 
products— for that is what you sell your produce for— and if there is any 
loss on it, who loses it ? You are the men who lose it. The farmers, 
the mechanics, the laborers, are the men who must receive it, and they 
are the men in whose hands it must depreciate, and they are the men 
who must be responsible. But if they had not the gold and silver to 
pay off these $1,600,000,000 of bonds, and liquidate them, instead, in 
greenbacks, how are you going to pay off the greenbacks when issued ? 
We have got to pay them in something. They issue ten or sixteen hun- 
dred millions of greenbacks to pay off all the bonds, because they 
haven't the gold to-day to pay off the bonds. Then, when you get the 
greenbacks, and come to a bank to have them redeemed, what will you 
have to redeem them with ? [Applause.] You have got no gold to do 
that with, and your currency will be worth nothing. Your money will 
be just in the condition the rebel's money was, over there, in Richmond, 
Va. He had been over there, in the rebellion, and had been making 
cannon for the Confederacy. When he went there, the money was first- 
rate. Confederate money was good enough. He got up in the morn- 
ing, put a two-dollar bill in his vest pocket, took his basket on his arm 
to buy his breakfast, which he would bring home in his basket and have 
it about full. He stayed there a year or so, and he said he then had to 
take the basket to carry his money in, and could almost bring his break- 
fast back in his vest pocket. [Laughter.] And you would be in that 
condition, precisely, if you were to pay off this debt in the manner the 
Democracy want to pay it. 

Let us illustrate it another way. . . . Suppose you, my friend, 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 1 57 

are in distress ; . . . you go to a neighbor and borrow money of 
him, and give him a note drawing ten per cent. You give him a note ; 
he has lent you his money ; you get out of your difficulty. As soon as 
you are fairly out of it, he wants you to pay him, and you say, "Yes ; I 
will pay you." How — how are you going to pay your debt ? Accord- 
ing to the Democratic theory you will give him a new note, drawing no 
interest. That is the doctrine ; that is it precisely. [Laughter and ap- 
plause.] 

The close of this great speech was wonderfully effective. 
Said the speaker : 

If you elect Grant and Colfax, you will have peace. Because, let 
me tell you, that man, Grant, will keep peace. These rebels know it, 
and that is the reason they do not want him to be President. [Great 
applause.] With Seymour and Blair, you will have revolution, in my 
judgment ; with Grant and Colfax, you will have peace and prosperity, 
in my judgment. Now if there are any soldiers here, [" Here's one ! "] 
I want to ask them this question. Let me illustrate our position as sol- 
diers, because you know that there is a sympathy between us that hardly 
ever exists between other men. It matters not how much we may dif- 
fer in politics, we have yet a respect the one for the other, if we know 
we have each done our duty in the cause of our country. That is uni- 
versally so among soldiers, whether they are Democratic soldiers, or 
Republican soldiers. Suppose, for the purpose of looking at this thing 
in the light of a soldier, we soldiers could have the matter arranged ac- 
cording to our taste to-day. Suppose that we had a stand built on this 
side of the street, and one on the opposite side of the street. Suppose 
that we had Seymour — and Blair and the Democratic Convention — on 
the platform, on this side of the street ; Forrest on his right, Wade 
Hampton on his left, Joe Williams behind him a little, and the balance 
of the rebels bringing up the rear. Suppose on the other side, Ave had 
Grant and Colfax, and the six hundred and thirty men in the Chicago 
Convention (three hundred of that number had served in the Union 
army). Suppose we had that arrangement, and suppose we had the 
power to call from their graves the three hundred thousand martyred 
brothers who sleep in the far-off vale, and who died that you and I might 
have protection. Suppose that we could bring all the widows in their 
weeds, and the orphans, and the one-legged and the one-armed soldiers, 
and we could place them in one grand row along that street, and pass 
them in review between these two conventions. I ask you, soldiers, if 
you could be at one side, and see that grand review, as it marched by 



153 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



these two stands, how would you be affected ? As the three hundred 
thousand sainted martyrs passed by, clothed in white, as spirits from 
above, casting their eyes to the right and left, there would be Grant, and 
his three hundred soldier followers, (and no rebels on his stand,) shed- 
ding tears of mourning over the ones that were left behind. These 
spirits could say to them, " We died for your benefit, and for your pro- 
tection." When they turned their faces toward the stand on this side, 
what could they say ? " Mr. Seymour, you said, we could not save this 
country ; that the draft was unconstitutional. You said, the war was a 
failure ; you signed a platform that said, the further prosecution of it 
would lead to anarchy and misrule. You have been nominated for the 
Presidency, and there are your friends, who represent your party, sitting 
about you." "Here is Forrest," says one, "who butchered me." An- 
other cries, " I am the spirit of that man who was burned, by that mur- 
derer Forrest who sits there, while I was lying sick in my tent." Another 
one says to Wade Hampton, " I am the man upon whose breast was 
pinned a ticket, that my General and friends might see that I had been 
hano-ed, while foraging in South Carolina." And these rebels sit there 
and see these men as they go by, followed by the widows, who hold up 
their weeds and say, " That stand bears the man that caused me to be 
dressed in mourning to-day." As the one-legged man goes by, holding 
up his crutch he cries out, " You are the man that caused me to have 
but one leg;" the one-armed man would shake his stump at Forrest 
and Hampton and Preston, and their rebel brothers, and say, "You men 
are the cause of my being a cripple for life;" and as the child came 
along, it would prattle and say, "When will my father return ? Thou 
art the man that gave me not my father back, but made me an orphan 
— thou art the man who murdered my parent — thou art the man who 
made my mother a widow." I ask you soldiers, to-day, if you could 
stand and gaze upon a scene like that, and then turn around and say, 
" I will vote for the man who sits upon that platform with his rebels, 
Forrest and Hampton, and all of them around him, who have made those 
three hundred thousand dead brothers arise, and given us half a million 
of widows and orphans, and crippled and wounded soldiers ?" ["Nev- 
er ! " " Never ! "] I say there is not a soldier, to-day, except he has lost 
his manhood, and there is not one man, except he has lost his patriotism 
and is lost to every sense of honor and propriety, in this country, who 
could gaze upon such a scene as that, and refuse to cast his ballot for 
Grant, and his friends who go along with him and head the great col- 
umn of liberty and progress as we go through this land. I ask you men, 
I ask you women and children,— the little boys and the little girls,— to 
picture a lesson of this kind in your midst, because, although you may 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 1 59 

say, " This is one of Logan's fancies," it is not. It is true as Holy Writ. 
There you can see the whole lesson. It is written upon the graves, 
upon the bodies, upon the arms and legs of men in this country, and 
upon the clothing of the widows and the orphans of this whole land ; 
and that lesson was written there by the hands of these men that I have 
mentioned, who to-day are asking you for your suffrage and for the con- 
trol of this country. I say, in the name of Heaven, in the name of pa- 
triotism, in the name of three hundred thousand murdered dead, and in 
the name of the flag and the Constitution and all there is that is near 
and dear to the people of this great land of ours, let us never disgrace 
ourselves by fighting four years to save a country, and then turn it over 
into the hands of the men who during that same four years attempted 
to destroy it. [" Never !"» Never ! " — and intense excitement.] But 
let us say, inasmuch as we have saved this land, we will perpetuate its 
institutions, and will make liberty and progress, and civilization and 
Christianity, our watchwords. We will make this great country of ours 
what it should be, by putting it into the hands of men that can protect 
it. We have preserved it, and will perpetuate it. 

LOGAN RE-ELECTED TO CONGRESS THE JENCKES "TENURE OF 

OFFICE," OR "CIVIL SERVICE," BILL LOGAN ATTACKS IT, 

AND SHOWS THE DANGER OF CENTRING THE POWER OF AP- 
POINTMENT IN ONE MAN. 

On January 8, 1869, Mr. Logan made a speech, in the 
House of Representatives, exposing and denouncing the dan- 
gers to the Republic, hidden in the Jenckes " Tenure of Office," 
or Civil Service, Bill. That bill provided for a very different 
sort of a civil service from that which has since been adopted 
and which is now in successful operation. In his opposition 
to that measure, as was remarked at the time, no one could 
question General Logan's disinterestedness. His position 
was unique. Other Representatives, from his own and other 
States, had their several districts, — and it was customary for 
Republican Representatives, as being the best informed 
touching the worth and merit of applicants for place, to be 
consulted, to a considerable extent, in the disposition of the 
patronage of those districts, — but he had no particular dis- 
trict. He was the Representative-at-Large from his State, — 



!6o LIFE OF LOGAN. 

as was no other in that Congress, — and hence had no interest 
in preserving- such local patronage. He honestly believed 
the Jenckes bill was not alone a vicious and unconstitutional 
measure, but one dangerous to the privileges and to the lib- 
erties of the people. He refused to discuss the measure 
upon the idea that " to the victors belong the spoils," because, 
said he, " the question involved in this bill rises far above 
that, and overshadows all such minor and petty influences." 
Passing the details of the bill in critical review, Mr. Logan 
said : 

It provides that a new executive department shall be created ; that 
the Vice-President shall be the head of it ; that a Board of Commis- 
sioners shall be appointed who shall have power to make rules and or- 
dain examinations under them, to divide the country into districts, and 
to delegate all their power to other parties. It further provides that all 
persons who may hereafter desire to be employed in the civil service of the 
Government, in any capacity whatever, shall be obliged to submit them- 
selves for examination as to their qualifications, after paying a fee, to 
this Board of Examiners or some deputy thereof. The appointments 
shall be made from the list of those who prove themselves to be the best 
qualified, and, when once appointed, they are to hold their appoint- 
ments for life, upon good behavior. Every branch of the service is to 
be divided into grades, and every incumbent is to be promoted from the 
lower grades whenever a vacancy occurs. A list is to be kept of all 
applicants, and as vacancies occur, from any cause, they are to be filled 
by the applicants who are awaiting their turn. The "Board" is to 
provide a species of court-martial or commission to try, adjudge, and 
punish all offenders. The decision of the Board is to be final as to ap- 
plications. There is no power of appeal or review. The President, 
Senate, or head of any Department, may not only require all applicants, 
in the future, to submit themselves to this Board, but may order all 
present incumbents to appear before it, and abide by their decision. 

Touching this vast concentration of power in the hands 
of the Vice-President, — which was his chief objection to the 
bill, — he continued : 

Whether he would use the power judiciously and disinterestedly is 
not now to be known ; but certain it is, that if you desire to keep pub- 
lic patronage out of party politics, the power of appointment must not 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. r 6i 

all be centred in one man. Is it not palpable that, if he so desired to 
use his power of appointment, the Vice-President could make himself the 
President, spite of all opposition and beyond all the efforts of the people ? 
The organization of office-holders which he could make, would be so 
firm and invincible, that the will of the people could never be expressed, 
nor executed. And the immense number of persons now employed, 
and to be employed, who cause — the report says — the patronage to be 
a political evil, would only make him the more compact. If it is an 
evil, in its present shape ; how much more would it be an evil, in such 
a shape ! Who would be the fountain-head of all power of promotion ? 
The Vice-President. Who would be the arbiter to whom they would 
look in the last resort ? The Vice-President. Who would be their 
benefactor ? The Vice-President. To whom would their gratitude be 
due ? The Vice-President. Whose interests would they desire to serve, 
and to whom show their gratitude ? The Vice-President. Who would 
command that vast number of civilians, whose number would be greater 
than the peace-list of the regular army ? The Vice-President. He 
might be a man so void of ambition as not to use his power; he might 
be so regardless of exalted station as not to attempt to gain it ; he might 
be so virtuous that all his influence would be for his country's good ; 
he might be so conscientious as never to know favor or affection ; he 
might be a paragon in public life — or he might not be ; and I never 
will consent to place the whole liberties of the people in the hollow of 
his hand, be he who he may. 

The bill, it is scarcely necessary to say, was defeated. 

EARLY STAND OF GENERAL LOGAN AGAINST MONEY SUBSIDIES 

TO RAILROADS THE EASTERN-DIVISION PACIFIC RAILROAD 

BILL HE URGES A SUBSTITUTE, CALLS A HALT TO SUCH 

RECKLESS EXPENDITURES, AND DEFEATS THE BILL. 

It was on January 25, 1869, that Mr. Logan in the House 
of Representatives called a halt to further money subsidies to 
railroads — the measure under consideration being Senate bill 
No. 570, " for a grant of lands, granting the right of way over 
the public lands to the Denver Pacific Railway and Telegraph 
Company, and for other purposes." His position was, that 
the Government had already given a subsidy to this railroad, 
of lands and money ; that it was not necessary to the advance- 



1 62 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

ment of the interests of the country that this additional aid, 
of $16,000 a mile asked for, should be granted; that the 
company was amply able to complete this road to the point 
desired (Cheyenne Well), fifty-four miles, without such aid ; 
and that deception had already been practised upon the 
country and upon Congress in subsidizing this road. The 
speech created a great stir at the time, and raised quite a 
commotion in the House itself. To this subsidy bill, Mr. 
Logan offered a substitute — his explanation of which will 
show the advanced position he took on the subject of rail- 
road-subsidies at that early day. Said he : 

What do I propose ? I propose this policy to be applied to this road. 
I propose that the Government shall guarantee the interest, for $16,000 
per mile, of the bonds of the road to Cheyenne Wells. I propose that 
that guarantee, when written by the Secretary of the Treasury on the 
bonds, shall become ipso facto a first mortgage on the railroad and all its 
fixtures and furniture. That is my proposition. What else ? In order 
to guarantee the Government against loss, to guarantee the Government 
against expenditures, to guarantee the Government against increase of 
public debt, I propose that all transportation of supplies of every kind, 
telegraphing, or any other indebtedness to this road, by the Government 
of the United States, shall be reserved by the Secretary of the Treasury 
from payment to the road and applied to the payment of the interest 
on the bonds as far as it will go, and that the company shall, ten days 
before said interest is due, deposit the money with the Treasurer of the 
United States for the payment of said interest. I propose, in addition 
to that, that the lands heretofore granted to this company, and the lands 
granted to the Denver Company, joining them together, shall be put 
into the market, as every twenty miles of the road is built, at $2.50 per 
acre, and sold to actual settlers, the money received from such sales 
to be deposited in the Treasury of the United States as a sinking fund, 
and that the Secretary of the Treasury shall apply that sinking fund to 
the purchase or redemption of the bonds of this road upon which the 
interest is guaranteed by the Government, and, as redeemed, purchased, 
or cancelled, they shall be turned over to the company. I propose that 
the Government, as well as the holders of said bonds, shall be protected, 
so that it shall not, by indebtedness or in any other way, lose one cent. 

I go further than that. I propose that if this company shall fail to 
pay the interest or any part of the interest every six months, then the 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 



163 



Government shall have power to take possession of the road and its 
fixtures and furniture, and apply its earnings, etc., to the payment of 
the interest or the liquidation of the debt. That is my proposition. I 
propose to protect the Government, and at the same time I propose to 
put it in such a position that the road itself can be built. These gentle- 
men say, " Oh, we cannot build the road." I say you can build the 
road. Why ? Because when you get the interest on the bonds guaran- 
teed they will go on the market, and the Government will be protected, 
and the taxpayers will be protected and not oppressed, which I think 
is a very important item in all matters of legislation, especially at this 
time. 

I look upon these grand improvements of the age, as a great thing. 
I look upon the work of stretching iron bands across the country, from 
the Atlantic to the Pacific, as one of the great marks of the intelligence 
of this great age. I look upon fastening together the East and the West, 
as a barrel is strapped and bound by hoops of iron, as one of the grand 
events of the age. You have almost completed what may be termed a 
bridge, from the Atlantic to the Pacific. This has been done at great 
cost to the Government, and in my judgment it has expended enough, 
without any sufficient security against liability. You have now opened 
the communication and shown what the country is. If it is inviting to 
capital, it will go ; if not, it shrinks from the task of struggling against 
the decrees of Nature. The Government has given aid, to the extent of 
millions and millions of dollars. Now let the Government stop giving 
in this manner, for it is recklessness. We have done more than our 
duty toward the country in this matter of money-subsidy, and now let 
us stop. I say let us stop, and stop now. 

We hear much said, in favor of economy. Many gentlemen make 
speeches, in favor of economy. One member says, "I am in favor of 
economy — as soon as I get my little bill through." It reminds me of Rip 
Van Winkle, when he became a temperance man. After he had waked up 
from his twenty years' sleep, he said that he was going to quit drinking, 
yet he did drink, — " Here's to the health of your family ; may they live 
long and prosper," — always saying, in reference to his promise to quit 
drinking, "This time doesn't count." And I suppose that is the way 
with gentlemen here. They are all in favor of economy ; but one says, 
"I want this little stump-tail railroad bill passed — this time doesn't 
count ; " and so another says, about another road. As Van said, " Here's 
to the health of your family ; may they live long and prosper — this time 
doesn't count." 

Sir, I say it is time to stop now. If you are going to apply the prin- 



164 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



ciple at all, you should apply it now. But gentlemen say, this is only 
fifty-four miles. That is true ; this bill is only for fifty-four miles. 
When the last bill was up, you, by strategy, made it seventy miles. If 
we put this fifty-four miles on, it will be one hundred and twenty-four 
miles. And then, the next Congress, they will ask you to give them 
subsidies from Cheyenne Wells to another place. 

Perhaps these gentlemen will say to me, " Why, Logan, you do not 
understand that great country we are going into, New Mexico." Per- 
haps I do not know anything about it. But I tell these railroad-men 
that, in 1847 and 1848, I travelled over the very route laid down, on this 
map, as their survey. I know all about the country through which 
their road will run, if ever built. I have been over nearly every moun- 
tain-path in that country. 

The lands in those valleys of Mexico are as beautiful as the eye of 
man ever beheld, and the climate is one of the finest that God has given 
to man. Fresh meat will cure there, while hanging in the open air, with- 
out the application of salt. It will cure, out in the hot sun, as I know, 
from my own observation. The country abounds with birds, goats, 
sheep, antelopes, and a great variety of animals, both domestic and wild. 
It is a country that will develop itself, as fast as a railroad goes through 
it, and become rich and prosperous without any Government subsidy of 
$16,000 or $32,000 a mile, and these railroad-men know it well. 

Now, sir, I say that I am in favor of the great march of improvement, 
of civilization, and a general development of all the wealth and re- 
sources of this country. But, sir, that is no reason why, as a Repre- 
sentative of my constituents, I should stand by, and see the Treasury 
every day, grow leaner and leaner by the inroads made upon it by these 
railroads and other corporations. I am not willing to do it. I say to 
my friends in this House ; I say to my Republican friends — though I do 
not regard this as a political measure by any means — that we pledged 
ourselves to our constituents, in the Convention that nominated our 
President-elect, that economy should be our watchword. If we are 
true to the men that elected us, we should stand by that pledge to-day. 
What are we now asked by this corporation to do ? We are asked to 
vote $16,000 a mile, against reason and against the will of our constit- 
uents, and against the declaration — not express, but clearly implied — of 
the Convention that nominated your candidate for President. We are 
asked to support this bill, which is in opposition to the policy, regarded 
as proper, expressed, as I understand, by the President-elect, his decla- 
ration having been made — not with reference to this particular bill, but 
generally with reference to subsidies of the character heretofore given 
to railroads — that it is unwise, at least in the present embarrassed con- 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 165 

dition of the Treasury. But this company comes modestly forward and 
says, "Subsidize for us these fifty-four miles of road ; slap you constit- 
uents in the face ; violate your party platform ; violate your pledges 
made upon the stump ; and, on the eve of the new administration com- 
ing into power, make a direct issue with it, on the question of involv- 
ing us in further liability. Let him understand that you are all-power- 
ful, that you ask no odds from him. Give the people of the country to 
understand that you defy their will in Mo" This, and nothing less, is 
what we are modestly asked by this company to do. 

This railroad-subsidy bill was defeated, and its friends at- 
tributed that defeat to Logan's powerful speech. 

THE ELECTORAL COUNT OF 1869 — A TURBULENT SCENE IN JOINT 

CONVENTION BEN. BUTLER's ATTEMPT TO BULLY CONGRESS 

LOGAN SQUELCHES HIM. 

When the electoral count was made in the hall of the 
House of Representatives by Acting Vice-President Wade, 
in February, 1869, in presence of the Senate and House, 
General Butler objected to counting the vote of Georgia. 
The scene which followed, was thus described by the Gales- 
burg Free Press of February 18, 1869 : 

Truculent, fierce, insulting in demeanor, manifestly under the in- 
fluence of vinous excitement, and wearing a look of pride and self- 
assertion, his (Butler's) voice was the battle-cry for all his followers and 
dupes. Tumult reigned supreme ; sober members blushed, while men 
who would not have supported Butler in his revolutionary atrocity had 
they not been drunk, hooted, yelled, and strove to make speeches — a 
dozen at once. Finally, when the Senate resolved in separate session 
that the vote of Georgia should be counted, Butler grossly insulted 
their honorable body, refused to submit to the decision of the presid- 
ing officer, appealed from him, and declared that the House should 
"kick" the Senate from its presence. The count was finished, amid a 
continuous scene of tumult verging upon actual riot ; and not until the 
supreme moment of the solemn announcement of the choice of the 
American people for their chief magistrate was even a semblance of 
order obtained. 

Butler, it seems, had given a party on the previous evening, which 
did not break up till daybreak. Here he had all his confederates, as 



I( 36 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

well as many others, and no doubt thought by plying them with wine 
to fit them for his purpose. There is but little doubt that the animus 
of the whole thing was Butler's personal hostility to Grant. For this 
purpose he made this attempt to throw the country into another rev- 
olution. 

Subsequently, Butler had the assurance to introduce into the House 
a resolution censuring Wade, the Senate's presiding officer, and urged 
its adoption with his utmost ability. Fortunately there were men upon 
the floor bold enough to meet him upon all issues, and wreck his scheme 
for the conquest of Congress. Bingham of Ohio opened the attack 
upon him on Thursday, and General John A. Logan, the eloquent, ear- 
nest, and courageous man of whom Illinois has so much reason to be 
proud, finished it on Friday by a resolution to lay Butler's motion, and 
as a consequence all connected with it, on the table. This was adopted 
by the emphatic vote of 130 to 55. 

removal of the capital to the mississippi valley a great 

speech — logan's powerful appeal for the readmission 
of virginia. 

In January, 1870, General Logan made an exhaustive and 
able speech on the question of the proposed removal of the 
capital from Washington to some central point in the Missis- 
sippi Valley. Of this speech it was said at the time by an 
experienced pen : " Logan's speech was probably the best 
he ever made, rising to fervor in speaking of the destiny of 
the country, and acute and powerful in other respects." The 
closing sentences of this speech were these : 

And now, sir, is the time to do this. A more favorable time will 
perhaps never occur — a time when it can be done with as little commo- 
tion as now. A new republic is springing into being ; the disgraceful 
blot of slavery has been wiped out, and our Government may truly be 
said to be remodelling on the basis of genuine freedom. The Goddess 
of Liberty, freed from her trammels, steps forth clothed in her snowy 
garments of true freedom. 

Sir, the bronze statue, above us, is not a true representation of the 
new republic. It should be clothed in snowy white. Yes, a new 
republic has arisen upon the old ; not on its ruins, but by its redemp- 
tion. It has been baptized witli the blood of more than two hundred 
thousand patriots. Then let us plant our capital in the centre of the 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 167 

Nation, at the commencement of the new epoch. The ashes of the 
martyred Lincoln have gone westward as the vanguard of empire. Let 
us follow them, I was about to say, with the remains of Washington. 
But no. Brave hearts met the foes of our country as well here, as there. 
The honor of the victory is as much due to the East as to the West. 
Joined, heart and hand, in the great battle of freedom, we will remain 
thus joined in our efforts to perpetuate it. Let the Father of the Re- 
public, remembered and honored by the people, rest quietly beside the 
old homestead of the Nation, while the father of the new republic 
sleeps near the new home of empire. 

About this time the bill, to readmit Virginia without con- 
ditions, came up. In a brief speech he said, as one report 
gives it: 

He intended to vote for the amendment, offered by Mr. Bingham, to 
admit Virginia without conditions ; and if he could not get that, he 
would take the next best thing he could get for accomplishing her 
admission — not because of Virginia statesmen or warriors, living or 
dead, but because the honor of the House and of the Nation was 
pledged to her admission on the proposition presented by the gentle- 
man from Ohio. If he made a contract with a rebel, he would live by 
it and stand by it. Congress had made a contract with Virginia, know- 
ing her people to be rebels. Virginia had performed her part of the 
contract, and Congress was bound to perform its part. 

Another acute Washington observer, George Alfred Town- 
send, in referring to an acrimonious personal debate which 
took place between Butler and Bingham, wrote at this time 
to the Chicao;o Tribune : 

It struck every intelligent man listening to that personal debate, 
that a man like Butler, who had done so much to drive the South into 
rebellion, spurred it on, helped it to abandon Douglas, and supported 
to the brink of rebellion all the worst pretentions of slavery, should be 
one of the foremost to hail the restoration of Virginia, deceived by such 
as he. Not so ! This bedfellow of Davis and comrade of Breckenridge 
stood at the door of the Union, the last man to forgive the people he had 
seduced. Political baseness has seldom an exemplification like this. 
General Logan, who had been a Democrat, made haste to say frankly 
that he hailed the readmission of the State, the more that he had voted 
with the South up to the time of the rebellion. Logan's speeches of 



1 68 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

late have been the best of his whole career, more prudent, in better 
diction, more national, and yet a fine fervor of feeling bears them on. 
His speech on the removal of the capital was one of the most elaborate 
arguments I have ever heard, and this speech of to-day closed with a 
piece of spontaneous eloquence which the Republican Party and the 
whole North would do well to indorse : 

" I am in favor of the admission of the State at the earliest practi- 
cable moment, so as to get these vexed questions, that have been before 
Congress and before the Union for years past, out of the way ; that all 
this strife may pass away from the halls of Congress ; that all the States 
may again take their positions in the family of States ; that they again 
may bow to the old flag of the Union ; that they again may turn their 
eyes up to the shining stars and there receive the light which the 
fathers of the country received, and which they transmitted to the gen- 
erations to come after them. I am for it, that the gloom which hangs 
around this country, and the dark cloud that has hovered over us so 
long, may pass away, and the light of heaven serenely shine once more 
upon the Republic of America." 

GENERAL LOGAN SECURES THE BRANDING, BY THE HOUSE, OF 
REPRESENTATIVE WHITTEMORE, FOR CORRUPTION HE AP- 
PEALS TO THE COURAGE OF THE HOUSE. 

In February, 1870, charges made against Representative 
Whittemore, of South Carolina, for selling cadetship appoint- 
ments to West Point and Annapolis, having been examined 
and reported upon by the Committee on Military Affairs, 
through its chairman, General Logan, the guilty Representa- 
tive undertook to resign, but owing to the efforts of General 
Logan, and in spite of the determined opposition of Butler 
to the punishment of Whittemore, the House very properly 
refused to accept the resignation, by which he thought to 
escape condemnation, and unanimously adopted a resolution 
declaring him unworthy of a seat in the House. In the run- 
ning debate that took place between Butler and Logan, on a 
resolution to postpone action in this case, which resulted in 
the defeat of such resolution, by a vote of 155 nays to 38 yeas, 
General Logan took strong ground in favor of preserving the 
moral character of the House of Representatives. As repre- 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. x 6 9 

sented in the condensed report of the Chronicle, he said, in 
answer to appeals for delay : 

He would go as far to protect the innocent, as any man who lived. 
He would judge a man justly, and even tenderly, and would invoke on 
his behalf the mercies which Heaven had implanted in the human breast. 
But while he would invoke on the side of an unfortunate man all the 
tenderness, all the charity, and all the mercies which the human heart 
could have within it, he would at the same time invoke the God of 
Heaven to give men judgment, to give them nerve, to give them hon- 
esty enough to decide what the law is, and what the standard of morality 
should be, in the House of Representatives. He would invoke every 
man that had a right to pass upon this question, to nerve himself to 
cut down crime, so that virtue and honesty might stand upright before 
the world, and be vindicated instead of condemned. What excuse 
was there for this delay ? 

And just before moving the previous question, on the 
motion to postpone, he said, in reply to Butler's attack on 
the press : 

The gentleman from Massachusetts had spoken about the news- 
papers howling about this thing. Certainly they did howl about it, and 
he did not blame them for doing so. If members of the House were 
willing to sell themselves like sheep in the shambles, he did not blame 
the newspapers for howling about it ; and if the decision of this case 
were to be postponed, the people would have a right to suspect all of 
them. If the House expected its committees to do their duty in in- 
vestigating frauds, the House itself would have to do its duty in punish- 
ing those frauds when they were reported ; otherwise the House would 
be saying to its committees, " We instructed you to do this, but we did 
not expect you would do it. We told you to investigate this thing, and 
to report if you found men guilty, but we did not expect you would do 
it." If the House did not perform its duty in this matter, it would have to 
send its resolutions of inquiry, in future, to some other committee than 
the Committee on Military Affairs. 

logan's plea for struggling cuba — he asks for the rec- 
ognition OF BELLIGERENT rights. 

February 17, 1870, General Logan having already intro- 
duced, in the House, a resolution recognizing Cuban belliger- 
ency, called it up. The resolution was as follows : 



170 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

Whereas, The people of Cuba have for more than fifteen months 
carried on active hostilities against Spain, for the purpose of gaining 
their independence and establishing a republican government ; and 

Whereas, They have established and are maintaining a de facto gov- 
ernment, and now occupy with their armies, and control, a large portion 
of said island. Therefore, 

Resolved, That the Committee on Foreign Affairs be instructed to 
inquire what reason now exists, if any, why the Republic of Cuba should 
not be recognized by the Government as a belligerent, and, as such, 
entitled to the rights of belligerents. 

The circumstances occasioning the introduction of this 
resolution were these : The patriots in Cuba had long been 
in revolt, as stated in the preamble, and at this time occu- 
pied quite a large part of the island. There was a great deal 
of feeling throughout the country over the fact that we had 
helped Spain, and done nothing for the struggling islanders, 
— that we had, in fact, supplied Spain with thirty gunboats 
with which to help suppress the revolution in Cuba, and had 
done nothing to help the revolutionists, with whom the 
American heart naturally sympathized. General Logan rep- 
resented this widespread feeling, — the desire to do at least 
as much for the patriot republican cause, as for its enemies. 
Hence the resolution, and the very able speech he made 
upon it. In it, he said: 

The question as to whether this Government shall or shall not accord, 
to the Cuban patriots, belligerent rights, is one of grave importance. 
On the one hand it involves the great principles of freedom and right 
of self-government ; on the other important national principles and nice 
distinctions of international law. Therefore, I hesitated on account of 
the somewhat meagre details and conflicting reports we have received 
in regard to the contest which has been going on in the island of Cuba ; 
but this uncertainty, I think, now no longer exists, as I expect to show 
in the course of these remarks. Another reason why I hesitated was, 
that this action places me in apparent opposition to that administration 
which I heartily support and with which I am in full sympathy. 

But, sir, I do not feel that I can discharge my duty and remain silent. 
If I should err, I have the satisfaction of knowing that it is better to err 
in behalf of liberty, than against it ; and if there is any doubt in the 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 



171 



minds of members on this subject, surely the benefit of that doubt 
should be cast in favor of freedom and the right of self-government. 
Let our various views as to policy be what they may, I think I can 
safely assert that all feel the deep current of opinion pressing upon us. 
Though smothered to comparative silence, we feel it like the hot breath 
of the slumbering volcano which precedes the rending upheaval ; we 
know it is there. Though the tongue of the Nation is comparatively 
mute on this subject, yet the mighty heart palpitates with sympathy for 
the struggling patriots of the Queen of the Antilles, and we feel the 
beating strokes. Even the voices of those who tell us to wait, bear in 
their tones an indication that behind the words lie deep fountains of 
sympathy anxious to gush forth in words of cheer. 

Sir, a greater mark of respect was never shown an administration 
than this ; and while I regret that this particular combination of cir- 
cumstances surrounds this particular case, yet I am proud of it as an 
evidence of the high regard felt for our present Chief Magistrate. And 
while I feel impelled, by a sense of duty, to differ with him as to the 
line of policy the Government should adopt in this matter, I do it with 
no desire to cast a shade of censure upon his action in the premises. 
I believe that in his own breast there lurks the deepest sympathy for 
this struggling people, and that he has in reality curbed his desires in 
order to carry out what he believed to be the better policy. Being com- 
pelled to act on the imperfect data he then possessed, he has cast the 
doubt in the legal end of the balance. 

But, sir, the matter has now been transferred to Congress as a co-or- 
dinate branch of the Government, for its action thereon, and we must 
decide for or against. 

After quoting - the authorities to show what constituted an 
actual condition of war, he proceeded to prove that the 
" Cuban Republic" was such in fact as well as in name, and 
that the Spanish Government had itself recognized the fact of 
war, if not the de facto existence of the Cuban Republican 
Government. He considered there were but two questions 
to be determined. One: had the Cubans reached the point 
where they should be recognized ? The other : Was it the 
duty of the United States to recognize them now, without 
delay ? He held that the Cuban cause had reached such a 
condition as to demand immediate recognition. He con- 
cluded in these words: 



I7 2 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

Thus far, Mr. Speaker, I have viewed this question in its strictly tech- 
nical bearing, but there is a moral bearing which should not be forgot- 
ten in the discussion. We claim to be the friends of freedom, and the 
advocates of liberty. We point the world to our Nation, as the great 
type of government. The Stars and Stripes are emblems of liberty, 
and the people of the world, wherever they have floated in the breeze, 
have learned to appreciate them as such. Would it not be a mockery 
to unfurl this glorious flag, in one of the Cuban ports, beside the gun- 
boats which have left our shores to crush out the struggle for liberty 

there, perhaps it might be where Spanish bullets shed the innocent 

blood of Speakman, a citizen of my neighboring State ? 

I appeal to the members of this House. Sirs, what would be your 
feelings were you there, striving, at the sacrifice of everything near and 
dear to you, to acquire that boon of freedom you had learned from your 
neighbor to love, and then see that teacher, in the embrace of your op- 
pressor, flaunting the emblem of liberty in your very face? Have we 
learned to love royalty so much, that we fear lest we should cross its 
desires or run counter to its plans ? Shall we exercise no discrimina- 
tion as to whom we will, or will not, accord the rights of belligerency ? 
Must we wait as long in the case of those who are struggling for free- 
dom and the right of self-government against bondage and oppression, 
as in the case of those who are fighting to impose burdens ? What is 
the basis from which our international policy springs? Is it freedom, 
or oppression ? Is it monarchy, or self-government ? Is it bondage, or 
liberty ? If we claim that it is based on the right of representation and 
true liberty, then let us extend that policy to every bright oasis that 
springs up amid the regions of oppression. 

Our Chief Magistrate has said, that the people of this Nation sympa- 
thize with that people struggling to free themselves from a government 
they believe to be oppressive. Yes, sir, the heart of this mighty Nation 
swells and heaves with sympathy for Cuba ; and could one vast chorus 
of cheers sweep across the narrow strait, in spite of all conventionali- 
ties and legal crotchets, it would sound above the waves that dash 
against the coast one hearty "God speed the cause of freedom in 
Cuba!" 

logan's army bill — it effects a saving of millions annu- 
ally ITS PASSAGE " THE GREATEST TRIUMPH OF THAT CON- 
GRESS." 

March 10, 1869, Mr. Logan, as Chairman of the Com- 
mittee on Military Affairs, reported, and secured the passage 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 1 73 

through the House, of his bill reducing the army, mustering 
out between four hundred and five hundred officers thereof. 
A special despatch of that date, in the Chicago Reptiblican, 
thus alludes to the brilliant success of his speech and man- 
agement : 

General Logan achieved the greatest triumph of this Congress to- 
day when his army bill was passed by the House without an amend- 
ment, except such as were proposed by himself, and without even a 
call of the yeas and nays. He prefaced the measure by a speech which, 
by unanimous consent, the House allowed him to extend to nearly two 
hours' length, full of suggestions, facts, and figures. He showed that 
the staff corps for our 37,000 men, is as numerous as France supports 
for her 500,000, or Russia for her 800,000 ; that the prices paid for 
office-rents by some of these, as by General Ingalls in New York, are 
enormous. He pointed out the evils of allowing army officers to hold 
civil positions, citing the case of Butterfield in New York, who, after 
holding one of the most important offices there, returns to his rank of 
colonel in the army, and cannot be tried for misconduct in his civil po- 
sition. General Sherman, Secretary Robeson, and a number of army 
officers were on the floor while he was speaking, and Sherman had the 
pleasure of hearing Logan's argument in favor of cutting his pay down 
nearly $8,000 a year. 

In the course of his speech, General Logan said, that 
"the saving effected by this bill would approximate to 
$3,000,000" annually. 

logan's reply to general Sherman's letter opposing army 

reduction and reform he demolishes it an eloquent 

protest against military dictation defence of the lib- 
erties of the people. 

On March 29, 1869, Mr. Logan, — after calling attention 
to, and having placed upon the record, a letter written by 
General Sherman to Senator Wilson, Chairman of the Senate 
Committee on Military Affairs, adversely criticizing General 
Logan's bill for the reduction of the army, which had passed 
the House by the latter's efforts and was then being consid- 
ered by said Committee, — made a speech which fairly demol- 



i/4 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



ished the statements contained in the letter, and exhibited at 
once the readiness and thoroughness of information which 
characterized the man in matters of legislation, as in others. 
General Sherman's attack, through the medium of this let- 
ter, upon General Logan's position and statements — how- 
ever trenchant it had at first seemed to be — was so rapidly, 
vigorously, and convincingly repelled by General Logan on 
the floor of the House, that it fell flat, and utterly failed in its 
object, which was the defeat of army reduction and reform. 
In concluding that speech, — which he did amid " Long-con- 
tinued applause upon the floor and in the galleries," — Repre- 
sentative Logan said: 

General Sherman says, that if his pay be reduced he cannot give re- 
ceptions. I do not care whether he can, or not. It makes no difference 
to me. Sir, I remember a grand reception which was once given to him. 
I remember that on the 22d of May, 1865, I marched around this Cap- 
itol and down Pennsylvania Avenue at the head of many thousand vet- 
eran soldiers, constituting the Army of the Tennessee. General Sher- 
man was marching in advance. He then commanded General Slocum's 
army, the Army of Georgia, and my army, the Army of the Tennessee. 
He was greeted with cheers by men and women, by white and black. 
Bouquets were strewn everywhere. Every heart leaped with joy ; and 
if the dead could have spoken, they would have shouted hallelujahs to 
his name. 

Nearly all of those soldiers who followed me down Pennsylvania 
Avenue were volunteer soldiers. They had been engaged in more than 
a hundred battles. They constituted the old Army of the Tennessee, 
which was first commanded by Grant, and which I commanded last. 
They never knew defeat. They are forgotten to-day. Their memories 
live but a short time. Fifty years hence, history will hardly know that 
these men were engaged in the war. A few regular officers will claim 
all the credit, and will get it all. I am willing they shall have it. I 
want none, myself: I claim none. But while this officer, the general of 
the regular army, is attacking us, there are in this House a great 
many men who were volunteer soldiers — perhaps not so great as he, but 
equally patriotic. They were mustered out of the service. They are 
content to obey the laws and do their duty. 

There sits a man [Mr. Paine] who, with one leg gone, slept upon the 
field, hearing during the dark, dismal night, no sound save the groans 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 



175 



of the wounded and the dying. He votes for this bill, and for that rea- 
son he is an " inhuman " man. Another gentleman [Mr. Stoughton], a 
member of our Committee, who concurred in reporting this bill, slept 
upon the battlefield in the same way, and now goes around this House 
on a wooden leg. I could name twenty men on this floor who bear the 
marks and scars of rebel lead. They are to be forgotten. Let it be so ; 
I have nothing to say ; but I have a word to say in behalf of the tax- 
payers, in behalf of the soldier, and the soldier's widow. In their name, 
in the name of those brave Union men who sleep beneath the sod of the 
South, in the name of their widows and children, in the name of the 
one-legged and one-armed soldiers, I protest against the use of such 
power in the hands of these few men to defeat a great measure of pub- 
lic reform like this army bill. 

I protest against this thing of dictating legislation to the country, be- 
cause a man is in a high place. I protest against any attempt to stifle 
legislation. I protest against the iron bands of power being woven 
like a net-work around the minds of independent legislators of this 
Nation. The people demand that the legislative branch of this Govern- 
ment shall be free, shall be untrammelled, shall be independent, and 
shall be unfettered, so far as military dictation is concerned ; and I say 
to the men who hold high positions in this country, that they are not 
the law-makers, but the law obeyers, and that they shall not dictate the 
amount of taxation to be paid for their benefit, or the benefit of any- 
body else. And, sir, whenever legislation is so stifled and so crip- 
pled that a man, who has independence enough to stand up here in 
defence of economy and efficiency in the public service, is attacked by 
high officials, through the columns of the newspapers, for the perform- 
ance of his duty as a Representative of the people, and legislation 
thwarted thereby, then farewell to the liberties of this glorious Repub- 
lic. 

General Sherman parades, as if for our imitation, the British army, 
with four hundred generals. If we should adopt the suggestion, and have 
four hundred generals, as in the British army, to one hundred thousand 
men, then, Mr. Speaker, we should give the death-knell to our free 
institutions. With such a military establishment, the Oriental world to- 
day is blighted and accursed. It puts upon the people the heavy bur- 
den of a titled nobility. I demand that the people of this country shall 
not receive any such strain. I demand that this country shall not be 
put in the same position as Europe. If a man in Europe gets to be a 
general he must be a duke, and if he gets to be a colonel he must be a 
marquis ; and while the people get two shillings a day, for hard labor, 
the duke or marquis must get $30,000 per annum, for doing nothing. 



176 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

Such is the rule, and such is the condition of things, in Europe. I wish 
to know whether this attack on me, means that this country shall be 
subverted into the hands of powerful military men, who are to become 
aristocrats, as they are in Europe ? I wish to know whether titles are 
to be established here ? I wish to know whether a body of nobility is 
to grow up here. 

I know the people are honest, as we have been told in that letter. 
Yes, sir, the people are honest, the people are brave, and the people are 
true. He [Sherman] would not have been a general, if it had not been 
for the people. It was the boy who carried the musket, who made him 
what he is. The boys who carried muskets so gallantly during the late 
war, made all these men who now hold themselves so high. They are 
the boys who made generals, and presidents, and can unmake them ; 
and I say, for one, I shall stand up here as the defender of these boys, 
and these men, of their widows and their orphans, and for the liberties 
of all the people in this country, against all generals, or marshals, or 
governors, or princes, or potentates, regardless of whatever aristocracy 
may be attempted to be set up in this land. While I live, I will stand 
as their defender. Living or dying, I shall defend the liberties of this 
people, making war against dictation and against aristocracy, and in 
favor of republicanism. 

The Army bill, although somewhat modified by the Sen- 
ate, still preserved its essential reform features when finally 
enacted into law — a result admittedly due to this powerful 
speech. 

GENERAL LOGAN'S AUTHORSHIP IN THE FIFTEENTH AMENDMENT 
AS FINALLY AGREED TO. 

It is a fact, not generally known, because of General Lo- 
gan's modesty, that he was as much the author of the Fif- 
teenth Amendment to the United States Constitution as some 
of those who have heretofore claimed to be. As that Amend- 
ment came from the Senate to the House its first section read 
as follows : 

" The right of citizens of the United States to vote or hold 
office shall not be denied or abridged by the United States 
or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condi- 
tion of servitude." 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. ijj 

Mr. Logan sought to amend this section in the House by- 
striking out the words " or hold office," as superfluous, the 
right to vote always carrying with it the right to hold office. 
The House, however, refused to adopt his amendment, but 
instead agreed to amendments offered by Bingham of Ohio, 
and sent it back to the Senate in the following shape : 

" The rieht of citizens of the United States to vote or hold 
office shall not be denied or abridged by any State on account 
of race, color, nativity, property, creed, or previous condition 
of servitude." 

The Senate disagreeing to this, a conference committee, 
comprising Senators Stewart, Conkling, and Edmunds, on 
the part of the Senate, and Messrs. Boutwell, Bingham, and 
Logan, on the part of the House, settled the disagreement by 
adopting Logan's draft, so that the section should read thus : 

" The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall 
not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any 
State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servi- 
tude." 

And in this shape, there being no disagreement as to the 
second section giving power to enforce it, it passed both 
Houses by the constitutional two-thirds majority.* 

* By reference to the Journal of the House of Representatives, 3d session, Fortieth 
Congress, the following proceedings will be found : On February 20, 1869, Mr. Boutwell 
moved that the rules be suspended so as to take up and consider the joint resolution of the 
Senate (S. R. 8), proposing an amendment to the Constitution of the United States. 
Agreed to : yeas, 144 ; nays, 37. 

Mr. Logan submitted an amendment to it, to strike out the words "or hold office. " 
Disagreed to. 

Mr, Shellabarger submitted an amendment in the nature of a substitute for the first sec- 
tion, but subsequently withdrew it. 

Mr. Bingham submitted an additional amendment, to strike out the words "by the 
United States" and insert " nativity, property, creed ;" so that it would read as follows : 

" The right of citizens of the United States to vote or hold office shall not be denied or 
abridged by any State on account of race, color, nativity, property, creed, or previous con- 
dition of servitude." 

This was agreed to, and the joint resolution was read a third time and passed by 140 
yeas to 37 nays. 

On February 23d a message was received by the House from the Senate, notifying it 
12 



1 7 8 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



logan's eulogy on general thomas — a fitting tribute to 
" the rock of chickamauga." 

On April 6, 1870, in the Masonic Hall at Washington, 
General Logan delivered an oration before the Department 
of the Potomac, Grand Army of the Republic, upon the life, 
character, and death of General George H. Thomas, the hero 
of Nashville, " The Rock of Chickamauga." Briefly, but in 
telling words, he thus sketched the turning-point in that great 
soldier's military career : 

When the army swung loose from its moorings at Atlanta, to sweep 
across the plains of Georgia, the troops left behind were placed under 
command of General Thomas to hold the enemy in check in Tennessee. 
And here, in some respects, was perhaps the most trying position of his 
life. Gradually falling back on Nashville to prevent the enemy from cut- 
ting off his communications, concentrating his forces and strengthening 
his cavalry arm, his delay and apparent inaction was misunderstood and 



that the Senate had disagreed to the House amendments, asking a conference on the dis- 
agreeing votes of the two Houses, and stating that Mr. Stewart, Mr. Conkling, and Mr. 
Edmunds had been appointed the conferees on the part of the Senate. 

The same day, on motion of Mr. Boutwell, the rules were suspended, the joint resolu- 
tion with its amendments taken up, the House agreed to the conference, and Messrs. Bout- 
well, Bingham, and Logan were appointed conferees on the part of the House. 

On February 25th Mr. Boutwell reported from the conference committee as follows : 

" The committee of conference on the disagreeing votes of the two Houses on the joint 
resolution (S. R. 8), proposing an amendment to the Constitution of the United States, having 
met, after full and free conference have agreed to recommend and do recommend to their 
respective Houses as follows : 

That the House recede from their amendments and agree to the resolution of the 
Senate, with an amendment as follows : 

In section one, line two, strike out the words "or hold office;" and that the Senate 
agree to the same. 

Managers on the part of the House of Representatives, 



Managers on the part of the Senate, 



George S. Boutwell. 
John A. Bingham. 
John A. Logan. 

William M. Stewart. 
Roscoe Conkling. 



This report was agreed to by both House and Senate, by the constitutional majority of 
two-thirds in each House. 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 



179 



his motives misinterpreted. The news of Hood's rapid and persistent 
advance into Tennessee, and apparently no strong effort on the part of 
Thomas to check him, was a riddle for a time, even at the headquarters 
of the army. Sensitive to every insinuation against his honor or his 
integrity, as one of his nature must ever be, it required all his self-con- 
trol to keep his own counsel. But he was equal to the task, and mov- 
ing steadily onward, perfecting his plans, he waited patiently the mo- 
ment at which to strike the decisive blow. When it arrived, it came 
like a thunder-bolt upon the enemy. 

Hood's army, shattered and broken, was scattered to the four winds, 
never to be again reorganized. 

This cleared away effectually the cloud which for a moment had ob- 
scured his fame, and his star shone forth with increased splendor.* 

Of Thomas' characteristics, General Logan said : 

He brought no peculiar trait into stronger relief than another, but 
blended them all in one harmonious whole. If there was any excep- 
tion to this, any feature that predominated over others, it was the 
power of his will, especially its power over himself — self-control. And 
this, united with his uniform urbanity, was doubtless the secret of that 
facility with which he acquired control over the troops under his com- 
mand, who seemed to obey, not more because duty compelled them 
than because they loved to execute the orders of their general. It was 
the secret of that power he possessed of instilling into his men his own 
indomitable and deliberate courage, that won him the sobriquet of " The 
Rock of Chickamauga." 

Intellectually he was peculiarly fitted for military life ; the very har- 
mony of his nature begat system ; and, possessing strong comprehen- 
sive powers, readily he grasped the points of his situation, and deliberate 
judgment concentrated the advantages and matured his plans, and en- 
ergy executed them. 

His heart was that of a giant, and swelled and palpitated with none 
but the noblest impulses. Sincere in all his words, his unreserved 
frankness and evident truthfulness in all his reports and communica- 
tions extorted admiration even from those who love to censure. Strict 
conscientiousness and punctual fidelity marked all his actions. " No 
taint of sordid selfishness, no miserable caprices, no stain of dishonor, 
ever soiled his fair escutcheon." His name will go down to posterity 
without a blot upon his character as a soldier, a patriot, or a gentleman. 

*But for Logan's self-abnegation, Thomas would not have had this chance. See pages 
87-88, and foot-note. 



!8o LIFE OF LOGAN. 

Envy and jealousy will seek in vain for a flaw or defect upon which 
to hang a doubt or fix a criticism. 

The peroration of this eloquent oration was very fine — as 
these few lines of it will show : 

He is gone ! Grief sits visibly on every soldier's brow, and pervades 
every loyal heart of the Nation. His noble form lies low, ready to be 
committed to its kindred dust. Earth never received into her bosom a 
manlier form or a nobler breast. The halo of his deeds and the bril- 
liancy of his achievements may almost be said to illumine the grave into 
which his body descends, and the fragrance of his acts of kindness per- 
fume his sepulchre. 

He has gone from our sight, but not from our hearts and our mem- 
ories ; there his name must live on, embalmed by our love and garlanded 
with our affections, growing brighter and brighter as time rolls on. 
The cold marble often bears in mockery a name forgotten but for the 
letters chiselled in the icy slab. It cannot be so with the name of Gen- 
eral George Henry Thomas : it is chiselled on the tablets of too many 
hearts to need the aid of marble or bronze to perpetuate it. 

As a soldier, a gentleman, a patriot, a man, his memory will go down 
to future generations, emblazoned upon the pages of history, pregnant 
with a lesson of wholesome emulation to those who shall in the future 
lead armies to battle, not alone in this Republic, but throughout the 
civilized world. 

This oration was very highly praised by the press at the 
time — although delivered at a disadvantage, in this : that ex- 
tended memorial services, including an oration by Garfield, 
had been had in honor of General Thomas, the evening be- 
fore, in the hall of the House, in the presence of the President 
and his Cabinet and both Houses of Congress. Yet one 
paper said : " The night after, at Masonic Hall, Logan's ora- 
tion flashed out with all its electricity and descriptive magnifi- 
cence, throwing completely in the shade everything hereto- 
fore delivered." Another paper, alluding to this meeting, said : 

General Schenck, Chairman of the House Committee on Ways and 
Means, presided. Members of the Cabinet, Senators, Members of the 
House, and Governors of States were present, some of whom took part 
in the proceedings. The hall (Masonic Hall) was crowded to reple- 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 



I«I 



tion by an enthusiastic audience, who had assembled to listen to the 
eulogy upon the life and character of General Thomas delivered by 
Major-General Logan. General Logan is an orator whose cast of 
thought rendered him peculiarly qualified to handle such a subject ; and 
his personal knowledge of General Thomas, and experience with him 
upon many well-fought fields, lent inspiration to the effort. The result 
was that as the orator rose with his theme and the grand and beautiful 
incidents were portrayed with all the fascination of the speaker's art — 
the power of pathos, the moving appeal, the awaking of emotion, — the 
assembly was constrained to manifest its feeling in frequent outbursts 
of applause. 

GENERAL LOGAN'S GENERAL ORDERS TO THE GRAND ARMY 

OF THE REPUBLIC, TOUCHING DECORATION DAY ELECTED A 

THIRD TIME ITS COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF GRAND ARMY ENCAMP- 
MENT RESOLUTIONS — A HANDSOME TRIBUTE TO "THE SOL- 
DIER'S FRIEND." 

On April 30, 1870, the following order was issued by- 
General Logan, as Commander-in-Chief of the Grand Army 
of the Republic, touching Memorial Day : 

Headquarters, G. A. R., 

Washington, April 30, 1870. 

I. The annual ceremonies of "Memorial Day" which have been 
firmly established by National choice and consent, will take place on 
Monday the 30th day of May. 

II. All departments, districts, posts, and comrades of the Grand 
Army of the Republic, wherever dispersed throughout the land, will 
unite in such manner and with such ceremonies for the proper observ- 
ance of the day as may be best suited to each respective locality ; 
and all organizations, communities, and persons, whose grateful aid, 
sympathy, and prayers sustained us through the dark days of the 
Nation's peril, and those whose loyal, patriotic hearts beat in unison 
with our own, and who have heretofore, or may hereafter, join with us 
in the observance of this National Memorial Day, are hereby cordially 
invited so to unite, and are earnestly requested to lend their aid and 
assistance in strewing the pure garlands of spring, that come with votive 
memories of love and prayer, o'er the mounds that mark the country's 
altar, and fold, in rest eternal, our martyred dead. 

This is the third public observance of a day which has become 



T g 2 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

marked, and National, for this sacred occasion. Many are now missing 
from our ranks, who were with us before. Time, with busy finger, 
counts the hours for all. "In the midst of life we are in death," and 
one by one our comrades are " mustered out " to join the grand army 
on high. Let this teach us that we should so live that, when we too 
are gone, it can be said, " He was a citizen, a soldier, and a comrade, 
without fear and without reproach." 

III. It is desirable that the memorial services may be preserved, and 
the department and post commanders will forward direct, to the Ad- 
jutant-General at National Headquarters, a record of such proceedings 
as may occur in each locality. Should the same appear in the press, or 
by pamphlet, a duplicate corrected copy is requested. 

By order. 

William T. Collins, John A. Logan, 

A djutant- General. Commander-in- Chief. 

It was at the National Encampment of the Grand Army 
of the Republic, held at Washington this year (1870), that 
General Logan was again, for the third time, unanimously 
elected its Commander-in-Chief, and the following resolutions 
were adopted : 

Resolved, That the memory of those who died that the Nation might 
live, should be kept green in the hearts of the people of the United 
States by the sacred observance of the 30th of May as a day dedicated 
to the decoration of their graves ; and we trust that the General Gov- 
ernment will not fail to exercise, under the war-power, its sovereignty 
over such of those hallowed resting-places of our departed comrades as 
are in that section of country which they bravely aided in conquering, 
and not ask the permission of the conquered that the soil thus conse- 
crated may be the Nation's forever. 

Resolved, That all departments and posts of the Grand Army, and all 
comrades in their individual capacities, use their utmost endeavors to 
promptly secure legislative action in their respective States in aid of the 
establishment and maintenance of homes and schools for the support 
and education of the orphans of all Union soldiers, sailors, or marines, 
without distinction of birthplace or of race, who were killed, or who 
died in consequence of wounds received or disease contracted, while in 
the service of the United States. 

Resolved, That while we recognize the equality of all soldiers who 
were mustered in, we respectfully suggest to the officers of the National 
Asylum for Disabled Soldiers, so liberally endowed by Congress, the 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 183 

propriety of promoting the comfort of the colored veterans entitled to 
a home, by establishing a branch asylum at the South for their occupa- 
tion. 

Resolved, That we earnestly request Congress to consider the pro- 
priety and justice of passing an act donating suitable tracts of the pub- 
lic lands to those soldiers, sailors, and marines, who honorably served 
in the Army or Navy of the Nation during the late war for the suppres- 
sion of the rebellion, in accordance with the precedents established in 
former wars. 

After congratulating the Grand Army on the re-election 
of General Logan, and speaking in high terms of praise of his 
address, the Grand Army Journal of May 21, 1870, says: 

General Logan is eminently a man of the people in all his sympa- 
thies and aspirations. He is a representative man — engaged in a ca- 
reer carved out by his own vigorous and indomitable nature. His 
friendly sentiments toward the volunteer soldiers are known to all men. 
In and out of Congress he has labored for their benefit, because, with- 
out detracting from the merit of the regular army, he believes the vol- 
unteer soldiers bore the heat and the burthen of the day in the war 
against the rebellion. 

Brave in the field, wise in council, kindly of heart, and earnest in 
purpose, with a record emblazoned on the annals of his country of 
which he may be well proud, he is yet in the prime of life. Such men 
render yeoman service, and are held in especial esteem. Faithful to 
the cause of right and truth and progress, he has had no devious ends 
to work out, no corrupt motives to keep from sight. Earnest and will- 
ing to perform the labor of the sphere in which he moves, his own in- 
stincts press him onward and upward to attempt greater achievements. 
This ambition is laudable — laudable because it is just, as its object is 
the public good ; and a brilliant future lies open before him, on which 
he enters with our warmest wishes. 

HOW GENERAL LOGAN WAS REGARDED IN " EGYPT " AT THIS 

TIME. 

In hoisting to its mast-head the name of General John A. 
Logan for Congressman from the State-at-Large, the Egyp- 
tian Sun of May 4, 1870, paid the following fine tribute to him : 

We do this with great pleasure, not only because we are for Logan 
for any position that he asks from the people of this State, but because 



1 84 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



he has proved himself to be the best soldier, the most efficient legislator, 
and the most eminent statesman that the State of Illinois has produced. 

General Logan is a native Illinoisan, has been identified with the in- 
terests of this State all his life ; has labored for its prosperity and the 
promotion of the best interests of its people for more than twenty- 
years. From the time his public career began, to the present, his 
course has been onward, and his life a practical exemplification of the 
motto " Excelsior." He has never disappointed his constituents, nor 
brought the tinge of shame to their faces. Whatever has been his po- 
sition, he has honored it, and wherever the people have placed him, he 
has worked unremittingly and faithfully. He has been no drone in the 
public hive, nor a hanger-on to the skirts of others. He has always 
acted independently. A strong partisan, he has been unwavering in 
the support of the principles that he believed best for the guidance 
of the American people, but has never hesitated at the call of duty, 
nor neglected, to expose wrong-doing among the members of his 
party. Always progressive, he has ever been in the front rank of those 
who, looking to the good of mankind and the political salvation of the 
world, are ready to make any sacrifice, consistent with the principles 
of justice and the genius of free institutions, in order to secure " the 
greatest good to the greatest number." 

But we need not dwell on the life, services, or ability of General 
Logan. His name is written in living letters on the history of this 
State and country. At the bar, on the stump, in the legislative halls of 
the Nation, or at the head of his legions on the field red with carnage, 
he has been equal to any emergency, and covered his country, his State, 
and his name, with glory and renown. 

ANOTHER BIG DEBATE ON CUBA LOGAN TAKES PROMINENT PART 

IN IT HE HANDLES BUTLER WITHOUT GLOVES. 

Again, June 15, 1870, the Cuban question came up in the 
House, and a great debate of eight hours ensued, which was 
graphically depicted in the New York Tribune of the follow- 
ing day. From that report the following is taken : 

When Mr. Butler closed, Mr. Logan obtained the floor, Judd having 
yielded the rest of his hour. There was " fight " in every line of Logan's 
face as he stepped out from his desk and denounced Butler's use of 
Cuban bonds on the floor of the House as unmanly, and unworthy of a 
patriot or gentleman, declaring that it argued known weakness. He 
distinctly charged Butler with being on both sides of the question, stat- 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 1 85 

ing that not three weeks ago Butler had been as earnest as he [Logan] 
claimed to be, a" strong advocate of belligerent recognition. His con- 
duct on this Cuban bonds inquiry was not to be regarded as the act of 
a gentleman. In the harshest language allowed to parliamentary de- 
bate, and some that transcended it even, Logan declared that the so- 
called Cuban inquiry was " a contemptible trick," begun by Butler with- 
out the knowledge of the House, and under cover of another matter. 
He [Butler] had sent his spies and detectives through the hovels and 
dens of Washington, seeking to drag the names of his fellow-members 
down among those of thieves and felons. At this point Butler, who had 
sat without showing any sign of feeling or excitement, remarked quietly, 
"The gentlemen is mistaken." "Not a bit of it," was the sharp re- 
sponse. During this exciting personal scene Mr. Logan faced Mr. 
Butler steadily, and the members gathered all around and near him. 
The entire Democratic side was vacated, and there was evidently an 
intense though subdued excitement. On the whole, the scene appeared 
to be enjoyed by all. Mr. Butler seemed to be the only one perfectly 
at his ease. Passing from this personal reference, Logan made a stir- 
ring and strikingly effective appeal to the House on the merits of the 
question, declaring that the issue was a question between despotism 
and freedom, and the only point for the House to decide was whether 
a state of war existed in Cuba. Whether a reporter had bonds, or an 
attorney had used them improperly, was not in the balance at all, and 
did not affect the real issue. Did war exist ? Should we recognize it ? 
These were the questions handled by Logan in an effectively dramatic 
manner. He said we would not have war, nor would any evil follow 
our intervening in behalf of humanity, and our recognizing the struggle 
as one for free institutions, free speech, and the freedom of all men of 
all races and colors. He made a most effective illustration of Mexico, 
when Juarez, as he said, carried the Republican Government in his hat, 
with not twenty followers, among the mountains of Chihuahua, while 
Maximilian held the country with more than forty thousand men. Did 
the American people, he asked, fail to discriminate then ? Was there an 
American soldier, he asked [turning fiercely on Butler,] who was then 
willing to recognize Maximilian, or indulged in sneers at the bonds of 
the Mexican Republic ? In rapid speech, with ringing sentences, fall- 
ing quick and sharp, like rifle-volleys, Logan assailed the sophistries 
with which the debate had been entangled. As he closed with an 
impassioned denunciation of what he declared was a growing tendency 
to ape monarchical and aristocratic opinion, and to respect only strong 
governments, — a sentiment which derided the people's struggles, and 
was always apt at excusing the acts of established order, however tyran- 



1 86 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

nical, — Logan made one very effective point in declaring that the op- 
position to Cuban recognition arose mainly from an' intrigue now in 
progress to buy it. He denounced the mere talk of annexation as a 
cheat, and declared his sympathies went with those in Cuba who desired 
to make a free and independent State, and not annex her to the United 
States. Mr. Logan left an excellent impression, which it was expected 
Mr. Banks would strengthen, but, to the disappointment of all, it 
was immediately evident that he was physically unable to hold the 
House. . . . 

WHITTEMORE AGAIN HAVING SECURED A RE-ELECTION, HE 

PRESENTS HIMSELF TO THE HOUSE AND ATTEMPTS TO GET 

HIS SEAT THE HOUSE, UNDER LOGAN'S LEAD, EXCLUDES HIM 

AND SENDS BACK HIS CREDENTIALS. 

We have seen how on a former occasion General Logan 
had secured the passage, by the House, of a resolution de- 
claring that Whittemore, who had escaped actual expulsion 
from his seat in the House by resignation, had made appoint- 
ments to West Point and Annapolis in violation of the law, 
that such appointments were influenced by pecuniary consid- 
erations, and " that his conduct in the premises has been 
such as to show him unworthy of a seat in the House of 
Representatives, and therefore is condemned as conduct 
unworthy of a representative of the people." This was on 
February 23, 1870. Whittemore at once went back to his 
district in South Carolina, and got himself re-elected to 
Congress. On Saturday, June 18, 1870, his certificate of re- 
election was presented to the House. A telegraphic report 
of that day's proceedings condenses the action had thereon 
as follows : 

Whittemore got out to-day without the trouble of resigning. Logan 
presented the case against him very forcibly, which, in a word, was that 
a man who had been declared by the House guilty of a penitentiary 
offence, might properly be excluded. Farnsworth, Schenck, and Po- 
land tried to have the whole subject referred to the Judiciary Commit- 
tee, but Logan insisted on the previous question, on a preamble setting 
forth the character of the offence and actions of the House thereon, and 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 1 87 

a resolution excluding Whittemore and directing a return of his creden- 
tials to the Governor of South Carolina. The previous question was 
sustained by 84 to 57, about 30 Republicans voting in the negative ; 
some because they desired further debate, and some from a wish to re- 
ceive him on the ground that it was his constitutional right to be ad- 
mitted, even if the House exercised its constitutional right of expelling 
him. Immediately afterward, on a direct vote of ejection, the ayes were 
231, noes 24. . . . The Democrats had a previous agreement not to 
vote, but some at the last moment decided not to adhere to it. . . . 
Scarcely a member spoke to Whittemore during the two hours he was 
in the hall, and when the vote was declared, he left, without a word 
from anyone. 

Alluding to this matter, the Missouri Daily Democrat of 
June 20, 1870, said: 

Logan, the untiring, " never in haste and never at rest," does excel- 
lent service in Congress. When there is a disagreeable duty to be done, 
an over-puffed balloon to be pricked, an ugly customer to be taught 
good-manners, by common consent Logan comes to the front. To him 
the House is indebted for the exposure of the sellers of cadetships and 
the (practical though not technical) expulsion of Whittemore, and to his 
ready promptness and pluck it owes the defeat of the attempt to smug- 
gle in this scoundrel, while the House was thin, on Saturday. 

We agree entirely with the New York Tribune that the place for this 
man is the penitentiary instead of the House, and shall be astonished 
and mortified if the Republican majority in that body tolerate the pres- 
ence of the scamp upon the floor. 

It is curious that the only argument for the admission of Whitte- 
more, that we have seen, came from the Republican, a Democratic paper, 
patriotically anxious to have Congress disgrace itself. 

Another of the many papers that gave him high praise 
said : 

Whittemore will find " Jordan a hard road to travel " while Logan is 
in the House. General Logan has won more praise from friends, and 
wrested more compliments from his political enemies, during the Forty- 
first Congress, than any man who has ever held a seat in either House. 
His presence has grown to be a necessity. 



1 88 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

LOGAN RENOMINATED BY ACCLAMATION IN 1870 — HIS GREAT 
SERVICES ON THE STUMP IN ILLINOIS, INDIANA, AND IOWA 

SENSATION IN IOWA WHEREVER HE APPEARED THE SEN- 

ATORSHIP. 

As serving to indicate the conscientious attention given 
by General Logan to the discharge of other Congressional 
duties, as well as those of legislation, — duties which, in con- 
nection with the departments and the demands of constitu- 
ents, often keep a Representative at Washington even after 
the adjournment of Congress, the following extract from the 
Washington correspondence, July 26, 1870, of a Sioux City, 
la., journal will afford a hint : 

Washington looks like a deserted village. All the Congressmen and 
Senators, together with their hangers-on, have left to seek a re-election 
at the hands of their constituents. . . . General logan was the last 
man from the Great West to leave here. It is believed that he will be the 
next Senator from Illinois, and, after that, his friends say he will have a 
walk-over for the Presidency. Logan belongs to that class of political 
men that will not give you the kiss of peace to-day, and betray you to- 
morrow. He has never gone back on a friend, and I don't think he 
ever ran from an enemy. ... I believe Logan to be the most 
honest politician in America, and further predict that the people of Illi- 
nois will stand by his retrenchment measures, and give him the Sena- 
torship so well earned by him this session. 

General Logan was nominated by acclamation from the 
State-at-Large for Congress, September 1, 1870, and ad- 
dressed the State Convention in a speech of one hour, which, 
said the Chicago Tribune, " was repeatedly and vociferously 
applauded." But he had not awaited this renomination be- 
fore commencing the campaign. He had already opened it 
at Cairo. Said the Egyptian Sun of Thursday, September 
1, 1870: 

General Logan's speech in this city on Saturday night was one of 
the most telling ever delivered in Cairo. The court-house was densely 
crowded, and the General held his audience spellbound for at least two 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 1 89 

hours. We have not time now to give an analysis of his speech, but 
must content ourselves with saying that it was a glorious effort, worthy 
of the man and the place. We hear of quite a number of men in the 
Democratic ranks who were well pleased with it, and who will in all 
likelihood support the Republican ticket. 

The New York Sun also said some kind things of the 
General at this time. In its issue of October 18th, it said: 

General John A. Logan is said to be a candidate for the office of 
United States Senator from Illinois, in the place of Richard Yates, 
whose term expires in March next. General Logan is now a mem- 
ber of the House of Representatives from the State of Illinois at 
large, and has attained a very distinguished position in that body. He 
is a man of great native vigor and originality of mind. His course 
upon the Cuban question has been such as to render him a great fa- 
vorite with all the friends of universal freedom. 

He was then, as the Du Quoin Tribune of October 20th 
said, ''making a lively canvass in northern and central por- 
tions of the State " of Illinois, and besides speaking in Indi- 
ana, had also effectively stumped Iowa. The following, from 
the Des Moines (Iowa) Register, October 11, 1870, will give 
some idea of the effect of his presence in that State. 

Of all public men living to-day, there are but few whom the people 
of Iowa regard with equal admiration with John A. Logan. 

General Logan, who entered the State of Iowa last Thursday, and 
has since made speeches at Waterloo, Newton, and Des Moines, has had 
ovation after ovation the whole journey. The State is filled with men 
who followed him in war, who were with him in battle, who idolized 
him in the field, and who almost worship him and his greatness now. 
His journey through the State has developed how unshaken and un- 
chilled is the bond of esteem and affection between him and his old sol- 
diers. At every point he has spoken, they have flocked in to see him, 
to shake hands with him, and to tell him how proudly they have watched 
him in his public career, and how he still holds their unquestioning 
confidence and lasting regard. There were in the Register office yester- 
day two men who had walked twenty-five miles to come in and see their 
old commander. Many affecting incidents occurred in the interviews 
between the gallant General and his soldiers. None of the great gen- 
erals who have visited Des Moines since the war have been received 



190 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



with so much of cordiality and enthusiasm as General Logan has been. 
As there is no brotherhood like that of comrades in war, so is there 
no admiration like that which soldiers hold for an illustrious and revered 
commander. This is General Logan's first visit to the central part of 
Iowa since the war, and he has been made to see how warm a welcome 
Iowa can give a man it likes. 

The Pontiac, 111., Sentinel and Press of October 20, 1870, 
after stating that General Logan had just addressed a large 
audience, notwithstanding the bad weather, at that place, 
and that " never was a more thorough, candid, and eloquent 
defence of Republicanism heard from the lips of man," pro- 
ceeded to summarize and eulogize his public record of ser- 
vice, and continued thus : 

His speech here on Wednesday, which we will not do him the in- 
justice to attempt to publish, as it could only be an imperfect condensa- 
tion at best, showed him to be master of the subjects which he handles ; 
we wish that more of our citizens could have heard him. His com- 
parison of the country under Democratic and under Republican rule was 
well drawn ; his eloquent description of our glorious strides in wealth, 
enterprise, and progress, since the rebellion was crushed out by the 
power of the Government, was grand ; his home-thrusts at the villanous 
double-dealing of the Democracy were welltimed and rapturously re- 
ceived. It was a grand day for the Republicans and a sorry one for 
our opponents. 

The Peoria Review, December 1, 1870, in discussing the 
approaching election of a United States Senator, said of him : 

He is a man of the people, ready, outspoken, and sympathetic. 
His canvass in 1866-68, and in the present year, has demonstrated to 
the crowds who have heard him, that he has the independence to de- 
clare his own convictions and the ability to defend them. As a political 
speaker before the people, he is at once the ablest, fairest, and most 
convincing in the State. As a member of Congress, his record shows 
him to be ready in debate, fertile in expedients, careful in legislation, 
liberal in his views, but an earnest advocate of economy in every 
branch of the Government. During the rebellion he earned the reputa- 
tion of being the best volunteer general in the service. A Douglas 
Democrat, he followed the patriotic counsels of that able statesman, 
and threw his influence, with all the natural impetuosity of his char- 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 



I 9 I 



acter, into the scale of freedom and the Union. Since 1861, no citizen 
of our commonwealth has done more in the field, on the stump, or in 
the halls of Congress, for the cause of progress, equal rights, and Re- 
publicanism, than John A. Logan. . . . There may be combina- 
tions at work that will set aside the choice of the Republican Party. 
In politics, as in love, the race is not always to the swift nor the battle 
to the strong. But if the members of the Legislature have a decent re- 
gard for the preference of those whom they owe the honor of their 
election, we hazard nothing in saying that John A. Logan will receive a 
majority on the first ballot. 

A PEN-PORTRAIT OF GENERAL LOGAN AN EXCELLENT ANALYSIS 

OF HIS METHODS AND MANNER IN SPEECH-MAKING, BY A CLOSE 
OBSERVER. 

A writer in the New York Irish Republic, of October 15, 
1870, gives the following- excellent pen-portraiture of General 
Logan : 

" Be sure you are right, and then go ahead," was the motto of David 
Crockett, and it also seems to be that of General Logan. And a glo- 
rious motto it is ! But it answers only for the single-minded and true- 
hearted, for him who is fashioned from the oak, not from the willow, and 
for him who loves the truth above all other things, and who is deter- 
mined to know it and adhere to it, sink or swim ; and such a man is 
General John A. Logan. 

Among all the young and growing statesmen of the country there is 
no man who stands as high with our loyal and patriotic masses as does 
General Logan. His intense patriotism, his magnificent military record, 
his great oratorical powers, his moral and intellectual rectitude, and his 
physical qualities and advantages, all combine to make him a great and 
enduring favorite with the brave, generous, and intelligent American 
people. And great as has been his popularity, it seems to be steadily 
increasing, instead of diminishing. The country sadly needs another 
" Old Hickory," and the people seem to be making up their minds that 
General Logan is the man for their purpose. And, by my soul, I think 
so too. And as the Irish Republic is read in other lands, by those who 
have never seen the General, I shall endeavor to give them a full-length 
portrait of him. 

General Logan is now in the full bloom and vigor of his mind and 
body ; he appears to me to be about forty years old, five feet nine inches 
in height, weighs about one hundred and eighty pounds, and is black- 



192 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

haired and "dark-complexioned," as the ladies would phrase it. He is 
as straight as a lance, and stands as erect as a liberty-pole, is broad- 
shouldered, full-chested, sinewy and muscular. His limbs are finely 
turned and proportioned, his step light, yet firm, and his pace easy, 
graceful, and measured, while he looks the very embodiment of mental 
energy in motion, physical strength in repose, animation in reserve, and 
fire in slumber ; a man whom no reverse of fortune could render ordi- 
nary or commonplace, and one evidently intended by Nature to be a 
leader of men. 

Nowhere does he appear to such advantage as when addressing an 
audience. In this attitude does he appear in all his vigor and glory, 
and in it should his portrait be taken. As he rises from his seat, whether 
it be on the rostrum or on the floor of the House of Representatives, 
he looks like a man who has come to speak on a subject of the most 
vital importance to his hearers. He appears to be concerned with noth- 
ing else on earth but the question which he is about to discuss, and the 
success of the cause which he has undertaken to champion. He always 
seems to me to be deeply impressed with the conviction that a public 
man does far more good or evil by what he says and writes than by what 
he does and inflicts. And this is actually the case. For the conduct of 
an individual does not affect but a small circle beyond himself, while his 
teachings or sentiments may affect for good or evil not only thousands 
of men and women living, but generations yet unborn. And this is but 
another proof of the General's fitness for the responsible position of a 
public speaker or teacher; and fully accounts for his habitual thought- 
fulness in look and feature, and earnestness in speech and gesture — pe- 
culiarities which in him are so striking as to secure the attention of the 
most careless observer of men and their ways. 

His voice is full, clear, and ringing ; and when aroused, as cheering 
and spirit-stirring as the call from a trumpet. His gesticulation is grace- 
ful and expressive, his pronunciation classically correct, and his enun- 
ciation distinct and emphatic, so much so that every word of his is as 
plain and precise as the note from a bugle. 

As he progresses in his discourse he continues to grow more and 
more earnest and animated in look, in gesture, in form, in feature, till 
his features glow, till his eyes flash, till his whole frame trembles and 
sways with that passion which is born of conviction and inspiration, and 
which commands respect for himself and sympathy for his cause, from 
the most stolid and hostile of his hearers ; instead of that other passion 
which is made up of rant and fustian, fuss and fury, and which excites 
only the pity of friends and the contempt of opponents. He is at all 
times one of the most earnest and animated speakers ; one whose looks 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 



193 



and words and gestures are full of inspiration ; one who carries convic- 
tion to every intelligent and ingenuous hearer, and inspires his friends 
with his own courage and enthusiasm ; but when worked up into a rhe- 
torical frenzy, so to speak, he is grand and irresistible. Then he bears 
down upon his subject as cavalry charge a hostile square, or as he him- 
self was accustomed to charge the public enemy on the field of battle, 
and with the same splendid success. When mounting to a climax, when 
wrapped up, lost in, and borne onward by his subject, it would be just 
as futile to attempt to check him as to stem a mountain-torrent in its 
headlong race to the sea. 

After hearing him on several occasions, and closely attending to his 
style and treatment of his subject, I have concluded that he does not 
attempt to write out his speeches and commit them to memory before 
delivery, after the barbarian custom of Edward Everett and Shiel and 
others, but thoroughly conjugates his topic in his walks or in his study, 
makes a note of the several heads into which he divides it in order to 
help his memory, and trusts to the time, to the place, and to the occa- 
sion for his language and his imagery, after the healthful habit of Grat- 
tan and Curran, and the great majority of our Irish orators. And this is 
the custom which best bespeaks a man of genius, and best befits a popu- 
lar orator or tribune of the people ; as the other best bespeaks the patient 
drudge, and best befits the stilted sentence-grinder, and stale and stuffed 
lyceum-speaker. And hence it is that the General's speeches have all 
the surprise and freshness of impromptu effusions, while they possess 
all the finish and solidity of carefully digested compositions. And hence 
also it is that frequent interruptions in the House of Representatives 
never seem to disconcert him, while they often seem to help him. 

He can be said to be as popular in the House as he is outside of it. 
His popularity with the masses is mainly due to his enlightened patriot- 
ism at all times, but especially to his splendid services in the field during 
our civil war ; while his popularity with the House of Representatives 
is due to the fact that all the measures which he introduces are of an 
important and National character, and that he is not only a steadfast, 
judicious friend, but also a courteous and chivalrous opponent. And 
these are sufficient reasons. 

I have never known General Logan to fail to carry any of his meas- 
ures through the House of Representatives, nor do I know of any reason 
why he should not always succeed, as he always observes all the condi- 
tions of success. While he is addressing the House all eyes are turned 
toward him, and all tongues are still, and silence reigns supreme where, 
13 



194 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



as a rule, there is nothing but bustle and clatter and confusion. And 
no wonder. For it is one of the richest and rarest of intellectual treats 
to hear him while urging the passage of some favorite measure of his. 
To carry a grand measure expeditiously and triumphantly through the 
House, give me the General in preference to any other man in it ! 

He gives me a correct idea of the Roman senator and General- 
tribune, who could pass at will from the rostrum to the farm, from the 
farm to the senate, and from the senate to the battle-field, and back 
again. In truth, I never meet him in the Capitol at Washington or see 
him on the floor of the House without being instantly reminded of those 
ancient worthies. For he is as brave and gifted and patriotic and chiv- 
alrous as any Roman of them all. We have to-day in America as 
splendid men as either Greece or Rome ever produced, and I am con- 
fident that the men and women of the future will say the same thing. 

LOGAN AT SPRINGFIELD HE CONTRASTS THE RECORDS OF. THE 

TWO PARTIES A PASSAGE OF REMARKABLE ELOQUENCE. 

In a most telling speech delivered at Springfield, 111., Oc- 
tober 15, 1870, General Logan said of the Republican and 
Democratic parties : 

Take now the records of these two parties ; examine them and see 
what the results have been, and by what they have been, judge what the 
results may be. 

Thirty years or more, they say, the Democratic Party had control of 
this country. While they had this control, they sowed the land with 
Democratic principles. Now, to this day, we see these Democratic 
principles cropping out. 

In i860, a rank growth showed itself to the eye. What was it ? The 
first result they produced, from thirty years' exercise of power, after 
sowing Democratic principles broadcast in the political soil of the land, 
was a crop of traitors springing up throughout the South, as if the land 
had been sown with dragons' teeth. Following upon that, came war, 
devastation, blood, and every crime in the red catalogue of crimes, which 
brought pain, agony, despair, woe, and calamities upon the land ; and 
all of this followed upon, and was the legitimate result of, the sowing of 
Democratic principles in this country during the thirty years they had 
control of power. And to-day, all the woe that has fallen upon this 
land, and all the calamities that have befallen us, can be traced back to 
the time when this party bore sway. 

But now take the other side of the question. Ask yourselves hon- 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 195 

estly and fairly, what has the Republican Party done ? Have they done 
anything ? What results have followed their action ? They have had 
control of this country for ten years. They too, like the Democratic 
Party, have sown political principles in the soil, and what has been the 
result ? This : where disorder and confusion reigned yesterday, you 
have peace to-day ; and where treason and dismay appeared before, 
there is perfect quiet now. Where before, to the view, a dissevered 
land was presented, you behold now the restored integrity of the Union. 
Where constitutions were duplicated, flags were duplicated, and ensigns 
of political sovereignty, you behold one Government, one Constitution, 
one Nation — that Constitution so amended as to be much better than 
ever before. That is not all. This land, that professed to be a free land ; 
this land, that professed to be a land of liberty,— and yet in such pro- 
fessions told that which was not true,— the Republican Party went forth 
in might and strength to redeem, declaring that this land should be in 
fact what it professed to be ; and, by one blow of the sword of justice, 
they severed from the limbs of men the last bonds that bound them ; 
and the slave, and the oppressed, leaped from the dark deep dungeon 
of his despair into the pure bright light of freedom and joy. 

Our country has advanced in Christianity, it has advanced in civiliza- 
tion, as no country ever advanced before. A standard of morals has 
been erected in this land, within the last ten years, far beyond what this 
world has seen before. You have seen the spirit of civilization. You 
have seen it as it moved upon the Far West, changing, to something 
brighter, the white sands, — glistening in the eyes of men until they 
almost turned sightless. You have seen it sweep over savage hordes 
till, dazzled by effulgent peace, they retire at its coming. Villages, 
towns, cities, spring up day by day ; school-houses rise, and church-spires 
point white spires to the destiny above, while light strikes into every 
place of shadow ; this broad, beautiful West, blooming like the rose, 
glows golden under the feet of progress ; and all that splendid triumph 
has been wrought out under the lead and guidance of the great Repub- 
lican Party. 

You are to-day a freer people, a happier people, a more prosperous 
people, than any other upon the habitable globe. For princely pros- 
perity, this peace and happiness, — the major part of it, — you are in- 
debted to the Republican Party. . . . 

By the Declaration of Independence, our fathers planted the blissful 
seed of the hope of man. This soil and this seed were never truly tilled 
until the Republican Party got into power. That seed they did till, until 
it grew and spread far and wide, — grew broadly, and expanded ; and now, 
beneath these kindly skies, behold its branches wave from zone to zone, 



196 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

from sea to sea ; and ac the sun of freedom thrills through, gilding the 
soft foliage, and sparkles and dances in and around and about it, the 
eye is tranced and sees a halo of joy and pride above it, like a gleam 
from Heaven, so rich, so divine, so pure, so lovely, and so endearing, 
that we tremble as we gaze ! And this is the vine to whose protecting 
shade all mankind, of every color and from every clime, are coming to 
partake its fruit — rich fruit, grown from the tree of liberty, and nurtured 
by the great American Republican Party. 

LOGAN PUTS THROUGH THE HOUSE A BILL TO ABOLISH THE 

OFFICES OF ADMIRAL AND VICE-ADMIRAL OF THE NAVY HE 

IS ELECTED TO THE UNITED STATES SENATE. 

Upon the assembling of Congress in December, 1870, 
General Logan at the first opportunity rose and offered a 
bill, of which he had previously given notice, to abolish the 
offices of Admiral and Vice-Admiral of the Navy. Mr. Sco- 
field desired that the bill should first be considered by the 
Naval Committee, whereupon General Logan said : 

I offer this bill, and ask immediate action upon it, without meaning 
any discourtesy toward the Naval Committee, and without any purpose 
of inflicting a wrong upon any individual. I have no personal feeling 
in the matter. I offered a bill containing a provision of similar char- 
acter in reference to the army, and now only ask that the navy should 
be put on the same footing. I care nothing about the present vice- 
admiral, nothing about his quarrels. I have no concern in them. I 
offer this bill without any reference to him at all, because there is a 
vacancy now existing in the office of admiral, and now is the time to 
pass the bill before the vacancy is filled. I offer this, Mr. Speaker, as a 
question of economy, commencing in the navy as we have already done 
in the army. I tell you that these useless ranks should be lopped off as 
opportunity is afforded to the Congress of the United States to do so, 
in order that the people may be relieved of some of the burdens of 
taxes now imposed upon them. The office of admiral was created for 
Farragut, and as a compliment to him, without any expectation that it 
would descend along the line. But it seems as if it were the intention 
that none of these high ranks should ever be abolished, but that as fast 
as one officer dies or resigns, the vacancy should be filled, and filled in 
hot haste, before opportunity is afforded for the Congress of the United 
States to act on the subject. 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 1 97 

Other members having spoken, Mr. Butler made a strong 
protest against allowing Admiral Porter to succeed the la- 
mented Farragut. One of the published reports of the de- 
bate said at the time : 

Mr. Butler spoke very rapidly, hesitated several times, not for a 
word, but to swallow his excitement, and had evidently, long before he 
ceased, carried with him the sentiment of the House. Mr. Banks fol- 
lowed in support of the bill ; but the House, and Mr. Logan, who had 
remained standing during Mr. Butler's remarks, felt that the work was 
done. Mr. Logan said, simply and calmly, that he believed the measure 
would redound to the advantage of the country, and particularly to the 
naval branch of the service, and that the bill was offered, not because 
of any feeling of a personal character toward any officer who might be 
affectqd by its passage, but because he thought it right, as a question of 
economy, to abolish as soon as possible, an office never before created 
in this country, and a rank which should never be given hereafter. On 
his motion to suspend the rules and pass the bill, fully three-fourths of 
the House shouted " aye," and the severest rebuke ever offered to an 
United States officer had been administered by the representatives of 
the people. 

During this same year, General Logan was elected by 
the Illinois Legislature, an United States Senator, to succeed 
Richard Yates, whose term would expire March 3, 1871. 
Touching his nomination by the caucus, an Illinois journal 
remarked : 

When the Republican caucus assembled last Friday, Logan had 
more than three to one over both his competitors (ex-Governors 
Oglesby and Palmer). It was a battle well fought and handsomely 
won. No man has deserved success better than Logan. Few men won 
a higher position before the country, during the war, than he ; and few 
have shown higher ability as an orator and legislator since the war. 
Bold, earnest, and honest, he has dared to denounce corruption and ex- 
travagance, and to advocate retrenchments and reform, no matter upon 
whose corns they pressed. We congratulate the country on his acces- 
sion to the Senate, where a re-enforcement of manliness and indepen- 
dence is greatly needed. 



I9 8 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

THE GREAT CHICAGO FIRE OF 1 87 1 — SENATOR LOGAN'S EFFORTS 

TO SECURE CONGRESSIONAL RELIEF HIS WONDERFULLY VIVID 

DESCRIPTION OF THE CATASTROPHE. 

The speech made by Senator Logan, January 16, 1872, 
before the United States Senate, on bills for the relief of 
Chicago, then lying in ashes, was one of the most vivid de- 
scriptions of calamity, and one of the most powerful appeals 
for assistance, ever made to a legislative body. After citing 
precedents for such relief, and showing the reasonableness 
and propriety and necessity of the thing in itself, in such an 
extraordinary case as this, and paying a grand tribute to 
those who had already so munificently answered the call for 
temporary assistance, he gave statistics showing the mar- 
vellous growth of that city in wealth, population, manufact- 
ures, trade, and otherwise ; showed how a temporary cessa- 
tion of taxation, as proposed by the bills, would permanently 
help the city without loss to the Government, and in a meas- 
ure benefit the whole country ; briefly described all the great 
fires in history: the burnings of Moscow in 1366, 1571, and 
181 2 ; of Rome in the time of Nero; of Venice in 15 14; of 
Constantinople in 1606; of London in 1666; and showed 
that the great fire in Chicago far surpassed any of these. 
Then he proceeded to paint the scene, of which he was a 
witness, in these wonderfully vivid colors : 

Here a storm of fire, as if bursting from the heavens, which for four- 
teen weeks had been like brass above our heads, began its work in the 
southern and western portions of our city, and spreading out its arms 
of flame to the breadth of a mile and a half, swept east and northward 
for three miles and a half, devouring everything in its pathway. Its 
fury, fed by the hurricane which commenced blowing about this time, 
as if to lend a hand in the work of destruction, caused the sea of fire 
to roll on with an impetuosity that no human power could withstand. 
Engines and all their accompanying appliances were of no more avail 
than human effort would be to stay the waves of the mighty ocean. The 
flames, as though amused at the efforts, would sweep through the 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 199 

buildings around them and shoot out their red banners from the win- 
dows and roofs behind them as tokens of victory. Leaping from house 
to house, and often with mighty strides vaulting over an entire block 
as avant-courriers of the host which followed behind, the very flames, as 
if conscious, seemed to revel in their work of devastation and ruin. 
The imagination of the superstitious at that time needed but slight im- 
pulse to look upon them as fiery demons sent upon us as a scourge. 
But while often passing by holes and sinks of iniquity, they swept with 
exultation along the sacred aisles of the churches, coiling like huge red 
serpents around the ascending spires, shooting out their fiery tongues 
from the summit. Now a tall spire of flame would shoot up with a 
vivid glow from some lofty edifice, quivering for a moment in the rising 
whirlpool, then, sweeping down before a fresh blast of wind, it would 
dash with wild fury against another building, apparently consuming it 
at one stroke. 

The fierce hurricane drew the fiery billows through the narrow 
alleys with a shrill, unearthly screech, dashing into every opening, like 
an invisible incendiary, its brands kindling each into a blaze with un- 
erring certainty. The sheets of flame, as they burst forth from the 
windows, eaves, and roofs, leaping upward through the heavy masses of 
smoke, literally flapped and cracked in the wind like the sails of vessels 
in a storm. 

Mr. President, it was a deeply interesting yet melancholy sight to 
behold the magnificent stone and marble structures bravely resisting 
the fiery assaults which were made upon them. The flames gath- 
ered around them to the front and the rear, to the right and left, yet 
they stood up majestically as if defying the enemy, their walls rosy and 
their numerous windows bright with the reflected glare. But the red 
surging waves, as if maddened by the resistance they met, rushed to the 
attack with redoubled fury, and soon fiery banners hung out from every 
aperture, and twisted columns of smoke ascended from all parts. The 
giants were conquered, and, reeling and tumbling before the fell de- 
stroyer, soon lay but masses of blackened smouldering ruins, silent and 
melancholy monuments of the former greatness of the " Prairie Queen 
of the West." 

The sun descended behind the huge clouds of smoke like a burning 
globe, and rose again, and still the rolling sea of flame rushed onward 
unchecked. The tempest tore huge fragments from the roofs and swept 
them like floating islands of fire through the sky, and the distant quar- 
ters where they fell were instantly wrapped in flame. The very stones 
were often calcined or split into fragments by the intense heat ; the 
metallic roofs and coverings were rolled together like scrolls of parch- 



200 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

ment ; iron, glass, and metallic substances were in many instances melted 
as though they had been submitted to the flames produced by some 
stupendous blow-pipe. 

It would be in vain, Mr. President, for me to attempt to describe the 
wild confusion and despair of the terror-stricken inhabitants. I have 
been amid the battle-roar where armies a hundred thousand strong were 
struggling in fierce conflict for victory ; where the smoke of the combat 
rose in heavy clouds above us ; where the dead and dying lay thick on 
every side ; but never yet have I beheld such a scene of despair and 
wild confusion as this ; and may God grant, that I shall never see the 
like again ! The people were mad with fright. Wherever there ap- 
peared to be a place of safety, thither they rushed in hundreds and thou- 
sands to escape the death which threatened them on every side. Seized 
with a wild panic, immense crowds surged backward and forward in the 
streets, struggling, threatening, and imploring to get free and escape to 
the van. Here one, frenzied with despair, as often as snatched from the 
flames, would rush elsewhere into the burning caldron ; there another, 
seeing all he possessed on earth reduced to ashes, would sink down in 
hopeless despair. At other points, hundreds could be seen rushing to 
the lake-shore, every other retreat having been cut off, and even here, 
pressed by the heat, smoke, and showers of firebrands, they plunged 
into the water as the only hope of escape. 

To attempt to paint the scene in all its true and horrible colors would 
be in vain ; all was confusion, tumult, and wild despair. Chicago was 
in ruins. Twenty-six hundred acres of ashes marked the site of its for- 
mer greatness ; twenty thousand houses were reduced to embers ; one 
hundred and ten thousand people were rendered homeless ; $200,000,- 
000 worth of property had served as food for the flames. 

Behold the spectacle ! Can anyone, having witnessed this sad scene, 
do less than plead for the ruined city? 

senator sumner's attack on president grant — senator 
logan's withering rejoinder — a noble defence of his 
old commander. 

At the end of May, 1872, Senator Sumner made his great 
attack upon President Grant and his administration of affairs, 
the object of which was to defeat the renomination of Grant 
by the National Republican Convention then soon to be held 
at Philadelphia. On June 3d, Senator Logan made a speech 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 2 OI 

in the Senate, in reply, that completely knocked the ground 
from under the ereat Massachusetts Senator's feet, and con- 
victed him of making a false statement of a declaration as to 
Grant which the latter Senator pretended had been made to 
him by Secretary Stanton on his death-bed. It was a most 
crushing rejoinder, as well as a noble defence of his old com- 
mander. After referring- to Sumner's boast that he had him- 
self organized the Republican Party in 1854, and had then 
and there proclaimed that " we go forth to fight the oligarchy 
of slavery ; " and, alluding with regret to the splenetic and 
vindictive attitude which that great Senator was allowing 
himself to take, Senator Logan said : 

Being at the birth of the Republican Party, the Senator said that he 
did not desire to follow its hearse. Let me say to him, or to his friends, 
he not being present, that if to-day he is following the hearse of the Re- 
publican Party, he is following that hearse because he himself with his 
own hand drew the dagger which struck it in its vital parts. If the 
power is in him, he has wounded it. If the power is in him, he has de- 
stroyed it. If the power is in him, he has become its slayer. But, sir, 
the power is not in him, to perform this work, to wit, the assassination 
of the party which, he says, he organized. No, sir ; strong men and 
honest ones by the many thousands stand by it, and will ward off the 
blows aimed at it by the powerful Senator and his allies ; and, sir, it will 
pass through this ordeal unscathed, and shine forth brighter and more 
powerful than ever. 

Mr. President, we did go forth and fight the oligarchy of slavery. 
The Senator fought it here in the Senate-chamber. Time and again 
have I been filled with pride, and been made to respect and honor and 
love the Senator from Massachusetts, as I saw him engaged in the severe 
and fierce battles which he fought against the oligarchy of slavery. I 
have seen him when he fought it face to face, so far as language and 
oratory were concerned. But, sir, let me reply to him, slavery was not 
destroyed by his speeches ; slavery was not destroyed by his oratory ; 
slavery was not destroyed by his eloquence ; slavery was not destroyed 
by his power; slavery was not destroyed by his efforts ; but by war, — 
by the sword in the hands of Grant, and the bayonets that were held by 
his followers, the chains of slavery fell and the manacles dropped from 
the limbs of the slaves. It was not done by the Senator alone, but by 
the exertions of the army, led on by this man against whom the Senator 



202 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

has made the vilest assault that has ever been made in this or any other 
deliberate body. 

Sir, his intention was to strangle and destroy the Republican Party — 
that party which he says he created. If he did, I say to him he per- 
formed a great work. If he was the architect and builder of the Repub- 
lican Party he is a great master-workman — its dome so beautifully 
rounded, its columns so admirably chiselled, and all its parts so ad- 
mirably prepared, and builded together so smoothly and so perfectly 
that the mechanism charms the eye of everyone who has ever seen it! 
Since the Senator has performed such a great work, I appeal to him to 
know why it is that he attempts to destroy the workmanship of his own 
hands ? But let me give him one word of advice. While he may think, 
Samson-like, that he has the strength to carry off the gates and the pillars 
of the temple, let me tell him when he stretches forth his arm to cause 
the pillars to reel and totter beneath this fabric, there are thousands and 
thousands of true-hearted Republicans who will come up to the work, 
and, stretching forth their strong right arms, say, " Stay thou there ; 
these pillars stand beneath this mighty fabric of ours, within which 
we all dwell ; it is the ark of our safety and shall not be destroyed." 
[Manifestations of applause in the galleries.] 

I say to the Senator from Massachusetts, that while he has struck 
this blow, as he believes a heavy one, on the head of the political pros- 
pects of General Grant, he has made him friends by the thousand, 
strong ones too, that were merely lukewarm yesterday. He has aroused 
the spirit of this land, that cannot be quelled. He has, in fact, inflamed 
the old war spirit in the soldiers of the country. He has aroused the 
feeling of indignation in every man that warmed his feet by a camp- 
fire during the war. He has sent through this land a thrill which will re- 
turn to him in such a manner and with such force as will make him feel it. 
For myself, I will say that I have sat quietly here for months, and had 
not intended to say anything : I had no argument to make, intending to 
await the nomination of the Philadelphia Convention, be it Grant, or 
be it whom it might, believing, however, it would be Grant ; but when 
I heard these vile slanders hurled like javelins against the President of 
the United States, it aroused a feeling in my breast which has been 
aroused many times before. I am now ready to buckle on my armor, 
and am ready for the fray, and from now until November next to fight 
this battle in behalf of an honest man, a good soldier, and a faithful 
servant. [Applause in the galleries.] 

The Presiding Officer — The galleries must preserve order. 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 203 

Mr. Logan — And I tell the Senator from Massachusetts, that if the 
voices of patriots were loud enough to reach the tombs of the dead and 
sainted heroes who now lie fattening Southern soil, their voices would be 
heard repudiating, in solemn sounds, the slanders which have been poured 
out against their chieftain, the patriot-warrior of this country. You 
will hear a response to this everywhere. As I said the other day, it 
will be heard from one end of this land, to the other. The lines of 
blue-coats that were arrayed upon the hill-tops and along the valleys, 
with burnished bayonets ready for the fight, the same men, although 
they have divested themselves of their battle-array, yet retain their war- 
like spirit burning in their bosoms. They will respond to this chal- 
lenge ; they will say to the eloquent Senator from Massachusetts, 
"You have thrown down the glove, and we will take it up." I tell the 
Senator he will find a response in his own State, that will not give his 
slumberings much quiet. He will find a response everywhere. The 
people of this country will not see a man sacrificed to vile calumny. 

logan's stirring speech at el paso — he exhibits the rad- 
ical DIFFERENCES BETWEEN DEMOCRACY AND REPUBLICAN- 
ISM. 

In a stirring speech at El Paso, 111., October, 1872, Gen> 
eral Logan, after explaining the radical differences existing 
between the Democratic and Republican parties prior to the 
war, proceeded to rapidly sketch the results of the war, and 
what the Republican administration of affairs had since done 
for the country. Said he : 

We have passed through four years of bloody strife. That strife, 
as all wars do, naturally brought something into the contest besides the 
principle that the war was inaugurated to preserve and perpetuate. 
The fact that the South made war to perpetuate the power of the 
States, — their right to withdraw from the Union, — naturally involved 
the rights of man. While they undertook to do this, the rights of man 
were involved ; and therefore the result of the war must necessarily 
either forever confer the right and authority of the States to secede, with 
slavery annexed, or it must produce exactly the other result — that other 
result being that it must forever put in the dust, and trample and de- 
stroy, the doctrine of States' rights as advocated by Calhoun, and at 
the same time must strike from every bondman in this land the shackles 
that bound him ; and not only that, but it must free the mind of every 



204 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

man that was bound. Whatever of genius God has given a man, he 
should be permitted to develop, as far as he can — he is entitled to it the 
same as other free men. Hence, emancipation followed ; and the prin- 
ciple of human freedom was riveted upon the Constitution. Every shackle 
fell from the limbs of the slaves ; and the people of this land, from one end 
to the other, could say one to another, " This is my home, my happy home : 
it is a free land, with all the signs of civilization ; and to it the people 
of the world may come and find happiness and prosperity if they will 
cast their lot with us." It was a declaration to the world that henceforth 
England was not to be the only country which could say that "as soon 
as a man's foot touches these shores, he is free ;" but that the United 
States of America could now say, " Here is freedom to all men, of all the 
world, of every section and country, — freedom in fact, and not a mere 
mockery ; freedom to every man, of whatever race or color, to exercise 
his mental and physical endowments, and to participate in making and 
administrating its Constitution and laws." It then became a free land, — 
the freest land on earth, — where every man had these same rights ; the 
same privileges were to be exercised by one as by another, and that 
same protection that was extended by the Government over one man, 
was also extended equally over every other man. This was our con- 
dition then, barring two things. One of these was that although these 
people had been made free, they were not recognized nor protected as 
citizens of the United States, and hence the Constitution was again 
amended so that all men, of whatever nationality, condition, or color, 
should be entitled to the elective franchise, and made equal, in the eye 
of the law, in all things pertaining to the protection of life, property, 
and reputation. We then amended the Constitution further, by adopt- 
ing the Fifteenth Amendment. That Fifteenth Amendment prohibited 
the wronging of any man who was a citizen of the United States, by 
denying or abridging his right to vote, on account of his color. When 
this was accomplished, the Republican Party was in power. If it is 
wrong, the Republican Party is responsible for it ; if it is right, the Re- 
publican Party is entitled to the credit for it : for no man outside of 
that party did anything toward procuring the passage of these meas- 
ures. Following out these things, or rather while these things were 
being carried into effect, other things were brought in as results, that 
were incidents in connection with the administration of the Govern- 
ment, — things, that must be carried along in order to carry on the ma- 
chinery of government, were transpiring, being enacted, and brought 
into force, such as the payment of the national debt by our system of 
collection of the revenue, external and internal. All these things came 
along, in their natural order. Then there was the reconstruction of 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 205 

the Southern States, and the putting into force, and execution, the laws 
that had been passed. 

These things, then, having been done, I ask you, as Democrats and 
Republicans, to travel with me for a few minutes, and tell me, as honest 
men, what fault you can find today against the Republican Party, or 
against the Government, or its administration of the affairs of the Na- 
tion through its agents ? What change would you make — in what par- 
ticular would you make it ? Lay the panorama of the past before the 
eyes of the countless multitudes of this land, and let them say if any 
people since the dawn of civilization — any people within the entire 
rano-e of history, any nation of ancient or modern times — have ever 
been in as good a condition as are the people of the United States to- 
day ? Now, then, let's see if that be true. You are to-day forty millions 
of people, spread over a vast area of country, rich, fertile, beautiful, and 
grand in everything that makes a country grand. The energy of the 
American people has no parallel in history. They say the development 
of Great Britain and her vast possessions is progressing faster than ever 
it did. But what is that, compared to the development of our own 
country by the genius and the energy of our people, living under just 
and liberal laws. And I do say that you never saw such rapid progress 
and development until the Republican Party came into power. 

Then take our system of currency, our abundant means of intercom- 
munication. By reason of the stability of our trade, the solidity of our 
institutions, the great productiveness of our workshops and our fields 
and prairies, and the firm basis of our currency, you can borrow money 
at five per cent, to-day, where before it was difficut to borrow at all (by 
you I mean the Government) ; and if this state of things continue for 
four years more, it will not need to be vindicated, but it will vindicate 
itself. 

Now, my countrymen, I state these things to you, not because you 
don't know them as well as I do, but merely to call your attention to 
them, and ask you why then should we change ? Show me one thing 
that the Republican Party has done that is not accepted as the will of 
the whole people to-day ; show me one measure that they have advo- 
cated that is not now a part of the people's faith ; and, on the other 
hand, show me one single thing that the Democratic Party has advo- 
cated during that time that is not now rejected by every one of you. 

Let us go forward in the way we have been doing. Let us try to 
keep the laws just and pure as we have been doing. Let us faithfully 
execute them as we have been doing. Let us diligently collect the 
revenues, and honestly disburse them, as we have done. Let us punish 



20 6 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

offenders against the laws, as has been done. Let our trade and com- 
merce, and our national prosperity continue to advance, as it is doing. 
If we allow it to do so, by a continuation of General Grant in office for 
another four years, we shall have a condition of things which has had 
no parallel in the history of any nation of the earth. In voting for 
Grant you vote for prosperity, for peace, for civilization, for Christianity, 
for the grandest glory that ever shone around a republic in the history 
of the world. [Great applause.] 

The acts of the Republican Party need no apologies. We would as 
soon think of apologizing for the rays of the majestic orb of day, that 
in their effulgence and splendor are thrown around us. So with the 
deeds of the Republican Party : they have given life and vitality to 
everything, and made bright and glorious our present, and given us 
hope of a more glorious future. It is our duty to support this party 
with all our might. Do this, and it will make our children thank their 
fathers for that glory which shall surround them and irradiate their 
pathway during the remainder of their lives. 

SENATOR LOGAN SECURES THE PROHIBITION OF THE SALE OF 
ARMS TO INDIANS, AND DEFEATS PROPOSED LEGISLATION OF 
AN INJURIOUS NATURE. 

Early in January, 1873, the Indian Appropriation Bill 
being before the Senate, Senator Logan offered the follow- 
ing important amendment : 

Provided, That the sale of arms or ammunition in any quantities, by 
any of the traders or their agents, at any of the trading-posts or at any 
other place within any district or country occupied by uncivilized 
Indians, to any Indian or to any other person within such district or 
districts, shall forfeit their right to trade with the Indians ; and the 
Secretary of the Interior shall exclude such trader or traders, and 
their agents, so offending, from such district or territory of country so 
occupied. 

Mr. Logan subsequently accepted a substitute similar in 
substance to his amendment, and the Senate adopted it. In 
supporting the same, Senator Logan declared that " there 
had not been a white man or white woman killed for years 
on the frontier by Indians, but had received the death-blow 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 207 

from a bullet or from powder that had been sold to the Ind- 
ians by a white man." He also stated that " in travelling 
over the plains last summer, and visiting some of the differ- 
ent posts and talking with the men in command and with the 
soldiers, he found it to be a fact that the Indians were abso- 
lutely furnished with better war material than our own soldiers, 
and with better guns than our own soldiers, and that the 
soldiers complained bitterly about it." Furthermore he said, 
in conclusion — and, coming from so well-informed a source, 
the statement had great weight with his brother-senators as 
well as with the general public : 

You have not had an Indian war or a massacre in this country that 
you cannot trace back, if you get the evidence, in its commencement, 
to the traders themselves. They or some of their men get into a quar- 
rel with the Indians, after having furnished them with the ammunition 
by which they are enabled, when aroused, to perpetrate war upon the 
whites. 

To the same bill, Senator Stewart having offered an 
amendment providing that all Indian agencies shall be visited 
twice a year by army officers, to examine the books, etc., 
and report to the President, Senator Logan objected, on the 
ground that it was " wrong in the light of economy and in 
principle ; wrong because it would injuriously affect the army 
by taking officers away from their legitimate duties ; and 
wrong because it would put two branches of the Government 
service in conflict." It was something of this sort — the de- 
tailing of army officers as Indian superintendents and agents 
— that had necessitated a measure which he had introduced 
in the House and which had been enacted into law, prohibit- 
ing army officers from performing civil duties. After a 
lengthy debate, in which he also opposed the amendment in 
that it would interfere with the stability of the army organiza- 
tion, the amendment of Mr. Stewart was tabled. 



20 8 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

GENERAL LOGAN'S ORATION BEFORE THE ARMY OF THE TEN- 
NESSEE AT TOLEDO, O., 1873. 

At the seventh annual meeting of the Army of the Ten- 
nessee, held at Toledo, O., October 15, 1873, General 
Logan, its last commander, was orator of the day, and the 
following is an interesting synoptical report of the oration as 
eiven in the Chicago Tribune : 

General Logan, the orator of the day, being introduced by General 
Sherman, delivered the oration. After referring to the social feature of 
the reunion, and disclaiming any intention on the part of the associa- 
tion to perpetuate the war spirit, he proceeded briefly to sketch the 
history of the Army of the Tennessee. With the organization of the ar- 
my, began the second period of the war history of the West. The 
army exhibited the restless activity and unconquerable energy of the 
people of which it was composed. Its soldiers knew the full meaning 
of individual liberty, but were as obedient to discipline as they were 
fearless in danger. Suddenly summoned from the various walks of 
civil life, they soon became an army of veterans. Sympathy between 
soldiers and officers was the substantial secret of success. The theatre 
of the operations of the Army of the Tennessee was more extended than 
that of the army of most of the kingdoms of the modern world. The 
Army of the Tennessee, led first by General Grant against Forts Henry 
and Donelson, pursued its way through the fearful carnage of Pittsburg 
Landing, past Iuka and Corinth, Port Gibson, Raymond, Jackson, and 
Champion Hills, until Vicksburg, the "Gibraltar of the West," sur- 
rendered, and the Father of Waters was open and free from its source 
to the Gulf. The war in the Southwest thus practically ended, the 
Army of the Tennessee had still before it a task of participating in the 
greatest military achievement of any age — the historic march to the sea. 
The fate of the rebellion was to be decided in the dangerous valleys and 
rugged mountains of Tennessee. The soldiers bravely did their part. 
The leaders, in determining the plan of the campaign, judged well. 
The Army of the Potomac pressed the enemy's front ; the Army of the 
Tennessee turned his flank and attacked his rear. The enemy was be- 
wildered by our strategy, and vanquished by our valor. Such a stu- 
pendous sweep, encompassing whole States, was not anticipated. The 
passage of the Alps by Hannibal and Bonaparte are the only historical 
parallels. At Chickamauga, the Army of the Tennessee won the first 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 209 

triumph of the new campaign, to which were soon added the victories 
of Missionary Ridge and Lookout Mountain. It preserved the honor of 
its name in the march to Atlanta, and consecrated every step with the 
blood of some heroic soldier. The terrible battle-day of July 22d, when 
Hood was routed and McPherson slain, is a day not to be forgotten. In 
that hour the command of the Army of the Tennessee fell upon the 
speaker, and in the victory of that day McPherson was avenged. Atlanta 
fallen, the army entered upon a series of weary marches, to reappear 
upon the Atlantic coast, presenting Savannah as a Christmas gift to the 
Union. The war was ended. The dead were in their graves. The 
crippled and the saved returned to the pursuits of peace, and the world 
has been taught the lesson that the Republic has no citizen more faith- 
ful in its cause, and obedient to its laws, than the soldiers who showed 
the full measure of their devotion by the offer of their lives in its de- 
fence. 

LOGAN ON THE STUMP IN INDIANA IN 1 874 HIS " ROUSING " 

SPEECH AT INDIANAPOLIS. 

After the adjournment of Congress in the summer of 1874, 
Senator Logan — having taken a brief rest — took the stump 
in Indiana. On September 29th, he addressed an immense 
audience at Masonic Hall, Indianapolis. A special despatch 
to the Cincinnati Gazette said : 

By half-past seven, the people, having filled every aisle and crowded 
upon the stage, were turned backward. The stairways, halls, and side- 
walks were packed so solidly that it was with difficulty General Logan 
and his party could gain admittance. His entrance was the signal for 
deafening applause, the band striking up " Hail, Columbia !" precisely 
at eight o'clock. . . . General Logan was received with three rous- 
ing cheers, after which he spoke for about an hour and a half, being 
constantly interrupted with deafening applause. At the conclusion 
many soldiers who formerly served in his corps crowded about, called 
to mind their field-sports, shook his hand warmly, and wished him God- 
speed. 

In that speech, as reported in the Gazette, General Logan 
said : 

A free people are always divided into two great parties, and these 
are based upon contrary theories. The Republican Party is organized 
14 



2io LIFE OF LOGAN. 

on the principle of universal liberty and equality before the law, and 
the protection of all. 

If liberty is good for one man, it is a good thing for all God's crea- 
tion. The Republican Party is a vindicator of equal political rights to 
all citizens. Its members are not so selfish as to deny to others, the 
rights they claim for themselves. Every objection to this is based on 
prejudice. To-day the American flag covers only free men, and this is 
the beneficent work of the Republican Party. Its theory leads to good, 
and the happiness of mankind. 

The theory of the Democratic Party is that men are in part free and 
part not free, and it leads right to the degradation of man. The power 
was exercised for a long period for the maintenance of slavery ; and 
since slavery was swept away, the Democratic Party, preserving the old 
spirit and going as far as the Constitution will allow, would deny to 
millions of citizens the right to equal protection, the right to education, 
worship, travel, burial, even to be protected from murder. Its theory 
and spirit are the same still, and can only be carried out by physical 
force and lead to revolutions. Republicanism liberates, and needs no 
violence. 

The fact that the Democratic theory has not been successful, does 
not change the fact that this is its nature. The result has been always 
the same ; and its last result is violence, murder, insurrection, and the 
overturning of the State Governments. They claim the right to limit 
the rights of others ; but if one hundred men may deny to four citizens 
the right to vote, why not to fifty, and then why not to all others than 
themselves ? 

Democrats object to the Civil Rights Bill, that it allows all an equal 
right to burial, to go to theatres, to schools, to church, to hotels. That 
bill does not say that they must all go to the same school, but gives each 
one equal rights to education. And who so base as to wish to keep 
others in ignorance ? Our Government will be destroyed, if it is ever 
destroyed, by ignorance. If the people are educated, the Government 
will stand unshaken through every trial. Men who would violate the 
rights of man can only be restrained by the strong arm of the law. That 
bill was necessary because the colored people were treated with every 
indignity by the Southern Democrats, kicked from the cars and mur- 
dered like dogs, when freedom had been conferred upon them, and de- 
nied the privileges which had been allowed when they were slaves. I 
hope that the bill will be passed. If we do not intend to defend the 
rights of the colored man, we should not have given him any rights. 
We must do it. In Texas, out of six hundred murders, not one has 
been a Democrat, and no man is punished. They have been accus- 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 211 

tomed, according to the Democratic theory of physical force, to regard 
the slave's life as subject to the will of the master, and they still regard 
the colored man in the same way. When sixteen were wantonly mur- 
dered in Tennessee the other day, and the President proceeded against 
the murderers, the Governor of Tennessee published a protest. In 
Louisiana they have defended insurrections. 

Touching the new so-called Independent Party of that 
day, General Logan said, according to the same authority : 

A new party has arisen, calling itself Independent, which is attempt- 
ing to establish itself upon questions of transportation and similar ques- 
tions. They say, both of the old parties are corrupt, but they intend 
bringing up a pure party. Now, as all our people belong to one or the 
other, and if both are totally corrupt, how can the third party make of 
itself a pure party ? Can you make a pure thing out of two corrupt 
things ? Two negatives make an affirmative, but can two corrupt par- 
ties make a pure party ? They claim further that they will defeat these 
old parties. They cannot defeat the Democratic Party, for that is al- 
ready defeated. If you defeat the Republican Party, you destroy the 
party of progress, the party which has saved the Union, and the party 
which is willing to be progressive. Take the transportation question. 
Who has suggested an improvement in this direction save the Repub- 
lican Party? 

After reviewing the work of Congress in this direction, 
and maintaining the right of Congress to regulate all com- 
merce between the States, he continued : 

Shall Congress, having the right, assert that right? It is plainly its 
duty to do so ; and thus far the Republican Party alone has striven to 
devise means by which transportation can be cheapened and im- 
proved, and the Democrats in Congress nearly unanimously opposed 
them. Will you leave the Republican Party, to seek your remedy ? 

The rest of the speech referred to alleged corruption and 
frauds, and successfully handled those charges. 

A REMARKABLE ORATION AT CLINTON PERSONAL LIBERTY 

TRACED TO THE FOUNTAIN-HEAD — OUR OWN GOVERNMENT A 
COMPROMISE BETWEEN OPPOSING PRINCIPLES. 

It was at Clinton, 111., at a grand celebration of the 4th of 
July, 1874, — attended by "at least 10,000 people," — that 



212 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

General Logan delivered an address which would stand along- 
side of any other effort of the kind ever made in this country. 
It not only gave evidence of great and careful historical re- 
search, but exhibited also the truest and highest statesman- 
ship. Throughout it all, — and it should be read in its entirety, 
as it appeared in the Inter- Ocea?i of July 6th, to properly ap- 
preciate its wide scope and broad, statesmanlike views, — are 
veins of earnest thoughtfulness, as well as true patriotic fervor, 
having well-defined purposes, and channels of practical action. 
The General's theme was "Liberty and Equality," and in the 
following interesting extract we shall get a hint of the amount 
of research, as well as original thought and vastness of scope, 
involved in his quest through all nations and all time for the 
birth-place of the principle of liberty. Said he: 

Let us now for a few moments examine the history of this principle 
of liberty, and see whence it originated and from whence we have de- 
rived it. Individuals are fond of searching the genealogical tables and 
records, in hope of finding some name of renown which they claim as 
of an ancestor ; and even when an American citizen gains a high posi- 
tion and honorable name, his biographers search the history of the 
past with the expectation that somewhere in the line of ancestors one 
of renov/n and distinction will be found. And so it is to a certain ex- 
tent with nations. English historians dislike to own the semi-barbarous 
Britons and semi-civilized Saxons as their true ancestors — at least they 
prefer to speak of their bravery and valor, to their savage customs ; and 
French historians prefer to look to Rome for their civilization rather 
than to the wandering Gauls as their ancestors. And so it is with many 
in this country, who strive to trace the great principle of personal lib- 
erty to its source : they try to trace the dim thread back to the days 
of Roman greatness, and to the Greek republics. 

You may therefore be somewhat surprised when I declare to you my be- 
lief that, humanly speaking, this great principle had its origin with the 
wild nomadic tribes of Europe and Asia, and not in Greece or Rome, or 
the great nations of antiquity. Nay, more : I believe I may even say truly 
that its practical illustration in our own country, to-day, is the result of 
the struggle, between that desire for nomadic freedom, and government 
rule, that was so long waged in the past centuries. I am aware I am 
now stepping beyond the text of my historical guides, but there are 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 213 

many things of the distant past which we are only now beginning to in- 
terpret correctly by the ultimate results which the forces then put in 
operation are now working out. 

While I believe that Revelation and the Christian religion have been 
the chief factors in freeing man from the thraldom of superstition and 
tyranny, and of elevating him in the scale of civilization and enlighten- 
ment, I do not speak of this at present, but of the human element alone, 
with which Christianity has co-operated in bringing about the result 
which we are here to-day to celebrate. 

Take a hasty glance at the great nations of the past, so far as this 
question is concerned, and tell me where you find the germ from which 
the tree has grown. 

Egypt, hoary with antiquity, has left her history written on her 
ruined temples, which line the banks of the Nile. These, and the pages 
of ancient writers, show us that, from the days of Menes down, she 
was under the thraldom of a priestly hierarchy, which even her kings 
seldom dared to encounter. Personal liberty and political freedom were 
terms unknown to her annals. Although often torn by internal wars 
and contending factions, although often overrun by foreign foes and 
incursive hordes, yet this predominant idea of priestly sway was never 
eradicated, nor its hold upon the people ever broken. It has been left 
for the inroads of modern civilization, imported from other nations, to 
arouse her from her long sleep. 

Persia and Media, consisting originally of clans and tribes, was cen- 
tralized under the iron will of the elder Cyrus, and taught to look upon 
the central government as the great and ruling power, and though the 
satraps long retained a nominal existence, this idea of central power 
grew until the laws of the Medes and Persians were considered irrevo- 
cable ; but the king, and not the people, was considered the government, 
and personal liberty and political freedom found no place in that 
system; and to-day the Shah holds in his hands the lives and property 
of his subjects. Even the crushing blows of the Macedonian conqueror 
failed to make a change in this respect. For a time, labor was made 
respectable and honorable in Phenicia, but as Tyre and Sidon rose in 
importance her merchants grew in wealth and ranked as princes, and 
the rights of the laboring masses and hardy seamen were no longer re- 
spected, and the germ of personal liberty and freedom, which for a 
time seemed to have found a foothold, was eradicated and crushed out 
by aristocratic tyranny. Greece and Rome arose, as it were, out of the 
ruins of the ancient Eastern kingdom. Already the struggle of the 
Western mind appears to have asserted its superiority. Although in the 
former, for a time, republican ideas seemed to predominate, yet personal 



214 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



liberty was an element wholly foreign to their institutions. Political 
freedom, it is true, for a long time was a prominent feature in both these 
nations, but it was wholly a different thing from that which we to-day 
understand by the same term, and had in it nothing of the element of 
true liberty. The citizen, although possessing certain rights and privi- 
leges in public affairs, was but an integral part of a political machine 
which ground him to powder, whenever he failed to move in the 
prescribed narrow path. 

Centralization was the prominent idea, and increasing the power and 
glory of the state was the required object of its citizens, to which wealth, 
labor, time, and thought were to be wholly devoted. Any deviation 
from the will of the ruling authorities of the state, brought summary 
destruction upon him who had the temerity to venture such opposition. 
See the hero Aristides leaving the city an ostracized exile, and the 
philosopher Socrates drinking the fatal cup for attempting this exercise 
of personal liberty of opinion ! 

The central idea of Roman civilization was municipal authority, 
yet without even a germ of personal liberty. With the fall of Rome, 
national power for a long period seemed to be broken and crushed, and 
society split up into fragments. A long, chaotic night ensued, from 
which civilization emerged in comparatively modern times. In all this 
survey, we nowhere find that germ of true liberty which we can 
trace to the present ; but, on the contrary, we find a constant tendency 
to centralization of power in the hands of the few. Even the republics 
of Greece were but another form of tyranny practised in the name of 
the state ; and, as Athens gathered strength and wealth, it gravitated to 
the hands of the more powerful few, and at the time of her glory and 
greatest splendor her ruler was a tyrant in the person of Pericles ; and, 
as the exiled sage and hero left the gates, a courtesan took the second 
place in power. In the height of her glory and splendor the seeds of 
her destruction were sown ; and Rome but repeated the history. 

But, fellow-citizens, I have said that, looking at the past from the 
human side only, the germ of true liberty was to be found in the wild 
nomadic tribes of Europe and Asia. And in order first to bring before 
your minds vividly the true idea of real liberty, I place before you, in 
the form of a question, the two extremes. See the wild Arab scouring 
over the sandy deserts of Arabia, directing his course only by his natural 
surroundings, his tent, his home, owing allegiance to none, and untram- 
meled by the conventionalities of fixed society ! Now turn your eyes to 
Persia, with its long line of historical records. See the citizens of Te- 
heran bowing their faces in the dust as the Shah or one of his high offi- 
cials passes along the streets ! Tell me, which of the two would you 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 2 l$ 

choose, if compelled to select one or the other ? What American citizen 
is there who loves liberty, that would not prefer the wild and roving 
life of the Arab, with all its hardships, rather than the abject slavery of 
the Persians? Here, then, you have the representatives of the two 
contending elements from which the present forms of European and 
American Governments originated. Egypt, China, and India, up to a 
comparatively recent date, were true types of the latter class, where 
liberty never took root, but has ever been a plant unknown to the soils 
of these countries. The wild Scythians of antiquity, who hovered along 
the borders of Mesopotamia and Persia, though tainted by a savage bar- 
barity unworthy of their fierce and reckless bravery, form perhaps the 
extreme limit of that stream which has resulted in the broad liberty 
which we enjoy to day, and which may be said to have culminated in 
the Declaration of Independence. I am fully aware that, in attempting 
to trace the line, we shall often find it very dim, and that, so far as this 
idea is concerned, I reach far back of any certain guides ; nor shall I 
attempt the discovery at this time, but will content myself with calling 
attention to one or two links. 

Using the term personal liberty in its broadest sense, it was doubt- 
less well understood by the ancestors of the German and other tribes of 
Central Europe. With the fall of Rome the ancient civilization was 
shattered and broken, and fell into ruins, as did the monuments of art 
and genius which it had reared ; the barbarian element gained the as- 
cendency, and, during the long historical night that ensued, there was a 
continued scene of confusion and conflict ; yet, amid it all, there was a 
germ of reckless liberty which needed only law and Christianity to re- 
duce it to order and symmetry. These two forces gradually arose in 
influence, as century after century rolled on. It has therefore been truly 
said by one of the ablest writers of modern times (Guizot, in his "His- 
tory of Civilization," vol. i., sec. 2, page 57) that "it was the rude 
barbarians of Germany who introduced this sentiment of personal inde- 
pendence, this love of individual liberty, into European civilization, un- 
known among the Romans, unknown in the Christian Church, unknown 
in nearly all the civilization of antiquity." Yes, I might add, in all. 
From the ancient, rude barbarian, through Saxon, Celt, and Gaul, the 
love of personal independence has continued to flow onward down 
the stream of time, from generation to generation, until, planted on the 
congenial soil of America, it has grown into a stately tree that all the 
storms of traditional royalty and all the thunderbolts of empires have 
not been able to uproot. Therefore, while we look back to Rome for 
our municipal law and first germ of jurisprudence, and to Greece for 
our rhetoric and architecture, we must go back at least to the wild no- 



2l6 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

madic tribes of Germany and Central Europe for the germ of that love 
for personal independence and liberty, which, shaped and restrained by 
Christianity and law, is the great element of strength and happiness in 
our own beloved Republic. 

Now, fellow-citizens, I would impress, if possible, in living char- 
acters upon your minds, the lesson and warning which even this short 
survey teaches us. 

Perfect individual liberty and personal freedom imply the absence 
of all law and government ; abject slavery is the other extreme. The 
more perfect the government, the less will be the restraint upon the in- 
dividual compatible with good order and proper co-operation with the 
state and society. Our government is based, theoretically and practi- 
cally, upon a proper compromise between perfect individual liberty and 
centralized power ; and when events cause a strong oscillation toward 
either extremity, it brings confusion and danger, and a rebound from 
one, always renders us liable to swing too close to the other. Not only 
does our form of government embrace this idea of compromise, but also 
that between the freedom of communities or States, and extreme Na- 
tional centralization,— either extreme being destructive of the great 
principles of our Union,— on the one hand leading to disintegration, 
contention, conflict, and self-destruction, while the other extreme ends 
in placing the power in the hands of the few, and the crushing out of 
the control of the many. 

Hence, it has been truly said that "eternal vigilance is the price of 
liberty ; " for on the one hand is Scylla and on the other Charybdis, be- 
tween which our ship of state must constantly steer for safety. 

The history of nations in the past, shows us very clearly that, as a 
general rule, danger chiefly lies in the direction of concentration of 
power, because it renders the prize more desirable, and increases the 
anxiety and efforts to obtain it. As a nation increases in numbers, 
wealth, and power, if at the same time the wealth and power is gravitat- 
ing toward a central point or into the control of a few, there will, as a 
natural consequence, be an increase in the efforts and desire to obtain 
the commanding positions and control the wealth, and in like ratio will 
be the increase of unscrupulous schemes and corrupt efforts to suc- 
ceed ; and this, unless checked, must finally end in the destruction 
of liberty. 

Happily, with us, the right of franchise and the use of the ballot-box 
in the hands of the people forms the great and wholesome check upon 
such a tendency and such efforts. Here lies the palladium of our 
liberties, which it is our duty, my fellow-citizens, to guard with an argus 
eye. Let this bulwark once be broken down, and soon every vestige of 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 21 7 

our Republican institutions will be rooted out, and liberty will be a 
word known only as of the past. 

A LEGAL INCIDENT IN LOGAN'S CAREER AMONG THE SILVER 

MINES OF COLORADO. 

A good and conscientious lawyer will always compromise 
a case in the interest of his client, rather than exhaust his 
client's means by fighting it through. The following incident, 
mentioned in the Washington Republican of April 2, 1879, 
shows the success which General Logan had in settling a 
fierce litigation, which had already caused the violent deaths 
of some of the principals. It seems that near Georgetown, 
Col., was a valuable silver mine called " Dives," and 
within half a mile of it another equally rich, called the " Peli- 
can."* The owners of the Pelican also claimed the Dives, 
and during 1873 and 1874, bitter and violent and mortal con- 
tention had arisen between the different parties claiming 
ownership of the Dives. Said the Republican : 

In 1875 the Dives mine was worked under an injunction, and Gen- 
eral Logan was there attending to the case before the courts. The mat- 
ter was quite a feature of local politics at the time, and the mine was 
almost as frequently heard of as "Logan's mine" as the "Dives." 
Since then a compromise has been effected, and the settlement of the 
matter to the satisfaction of both parties has been largely accorded to 
General Logan's management of it. The tunnel to the Dives mine is 
600 feet long— one shaft 130 and another no feet deep. During the 
summer of 1875, Senator Logan might be seen, in a sort of demi-mili- 
tary dress, seated upon a handsome black horse, ascending the steep 

* These were not the only mines in which General Logan was interested in Colorado. 
The Chicago Daily JVeivs recently said : 

"He once narrowly escaped riches. Some years ago John L. Routt, formerly of Illinois, 
but now of Colorado, came to Washington to raise money for the development of the Even- 
ing Star Mine, of Leadville. General Logan subscribed for some of the stock, and paid a 
small assessment. The outlook was unfavorable, and when the second assessment was 
made on the stockholders, Logan refused to pay it and surrendered his shares to Routt. 
Within a few months a rich lead was discovered and the stock sprang from less than noth- 
ing to away above par. It made big dividends, and was finally sold at an enormous figure. 
Routt and all those interested with him were made rich, but Logan got only his original in- 
vestment, which was refunded to him." 



2I g LIFE OF LOGAN. 

dangerous road from Georgetown to the Dives mine, fully verifying 
General Sherman's assertion that " Logan was very handsome on horse- 
back." 

LOGAN TALKED OF "FOR PRESIDENT IN 1 876." 

As far back as 1870, General Logan's name was occa- 
sionally mentioned in the press of the country as a Presi- 
dential possibility. In 1874 his name was frequently men- 
tioned in connection with the coming nominations in 1876. 
Among other papers, the Washington Republican of June 8, 
1874, said: 

The Presidential probabilities and possibilities of 1876 are just now 
the subject of considerable speculation and discussion in many of the 
principal journals of the country, and if we may believe the public 
prints, topics of no little interest to many of our leading statesmen and 
politicians. . . . General Logan represents what may be called the 
elan of the party. No man is more popular on the " stump," and with 
a good backing in a convention the chances are at least five to one that 
he would carry it by storm. 

Only three days afterward, June nth, the Post and Mail 
stated that — 

At McLeansboro' yesterday the Republican Convention unani- 
mously and enthusiastically resolved in favor of John A. Logan for Presi- 
dent in 1876. 

WHAT THE OLD SOLDIERS THOUGHT OF LOGAN'S EFFORTS IN 
THEIR BEHALF IN CONGRESS. 

To show the warm regard the soldiers had for General 
Logan — those of other States as well as his own — the follow- 
ing letter in the Inter- Ocean of May, 1875, is given : 

Keokuk, Ia., May 17, 1875. 
To the Editor of the Inter-Ocean : 

By this mail we have sent to the Hon. John A. Logan, of your State, 
a brief letter of thanks, of which the enclosed is a copy. It is a volun- 
tary offering of soldiers who admire the brave military leader to whom 
it is addressed, and who have witnessed the devotion with which he has 
labored for the interests of the private soldier in both Houses of Con- 
gress, especially during the pendency of the late bill providing for an 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 



219 



equalization of bounties. That the bill did not become a law was not 
owing to any lack of zeal or labor in its behalf by John A. Logan. We 
feel unbounded gratitude to him on account of his labors, and therefore 
have forwarded to him our humble letter of thanks. R. M. J. 

The enclosure, addressed to "John A. Logan, United 
States Senator," is in these words, 

Sir : The undersigned soldiers and sailors of Iowa thank you for the 
bold and statesmanlike manner in which you have presented our inter- 
ests in the Forty-third Congress. 

This is signed by seventy old soldiers of the Union army, 
with the titles of their regiments, etc., attached. 

logan's tilt with confederate brigadiers, in 1876 — his 
defence of sheridan and grant — the white league 

" banditti " democratic " sympathizers " in the senate 

roughly handled — the old ship. 

We have seen how, in his speech on Reconstruction, in 
1867, before the House of Representatives, General Logan 
gave the Northern Copperheads more than they bargained 
for, when they assailed him. So also, in the Senate, in 1876, 
during a great two-days' speech which he made in defence of 
President Grant's conduct of affairs in Louisiana, and of 
General Sheridan, — who, for calling the murderous White- 
Leaguers "banditti," had been savagely attacked by the Con- 
federate brigadiers in Congress, — the brigadiers aforesaid, 
and their coadjutors, were never before so severely handled. 
As a specimen of the manner in which he handled them, 
it may be stated that, after alluding to the denunciations, 
aspersions, perversions, and falsehoods of which they had 
been guilty, and by which they were seeking to deceive the 
North and inflame it against the Republican administra- 
tion as a commencement of the Presidential campaign of 
1876, Senator Logan proceeded: 

Sir, I ask you what Governor Kellogg was to do after that horrible 
scene at Colfax ; after the taking possession of five persons at Cou- 



220 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

shatta— Northern men, who had gone there with their capital and 
invested it and built up a thriving little village, but who were taken 
out and murdered in cold blood ; and not only that, but they had mur- 
dered one of the judges and the district attorney, and compelled the 
judge and district attorney of that jurisdiction to resign, and then 
murdered the acting district attorney. My friend from Georgia [Mr. 
Gordon] said, in his way and manner of saying things, "Why do you 
not try these people for murdering those men at Coushatta? You have 
the judge, and you have the district attorney." Unfortunately for my 
friend's statement, we have neither. Your friends had murdered the 
attorney, and had murdered a judge before the new judge had been 
appointed, who had to resign to save his life. The acting district 
attorney was murdered by the same "banditti" that murdered the five 
Northern men at Coushatta. 

Here Mr. Gordon, — a Confederate General, and one of 
the bravest of them all, — interposed again with, " Will the 
Senator allow me to ask him a question ? " " Certainly," 
said Losran. Then, said Mr. Gordon, " Where was the 
United States Court at that time ? Where was the enforce- 
ment act? Where was the army of the United States? 
Could not the United States Court under the enforce- 
ment act take cognizance of these facts ? Was the district 
attorney of the United States not present?" "I will 
inform the Senator where they were," said Logan, as his 
eyes flashed: " The district attorney was in his grave, put 
there by your political friends. The judge had been mur- 
dered a year before. The one appointed in his place had to 
resign to save his life. The United States Court was in 
New Orleans. And he asks where was the United States 
army f Great God ! do you want the army ? I thought 
you had been railing at its use." Well might Mr. Gordon 
confess himself overwhelmed by this crushing retort ; and 
later, when Gordon defied General Logan to make good a 
charge he had just made against him, and in a blustering way 
said, " He has made the charge ; I ask him to make it good, 
or to withdrazv it, — one of the two," General Logan with 
a contemptuous half-smile replied with meaning emphasis, 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 22 [ 

" Ah, well, the Senator need not commence talking- to me about 
withdrawing." " Very well," said Mr. Gordon, subsiding; 
and, with increased emphasis, said General Logan: " f am 
not of that kind." Still later in the exciting tilt, General 
Logan said, in answering a question put to him by the ex- 
Confederate brigadier, " If he treats other men kindly, in a 
kindly spirit will I respond to him ? If he treats other men 
in a denunciatory tone " — and here he tossed back his black 
hair while his black eyes blazed again — " I tell him that is a 
game two can play at I " 

After passing in review the proceedings of the revolu- 
tionary Legislature of Louisiana, and the other circumstances 
of the situation there, and showing up the inconsistent atti- 
tude of the Democracy in now finding fault with what they 
applauded in General Jackson's day, and what they them- 
selves through President Pierce did in Boston in 1854, when 
he ordered troops to capture a fugitive slave in that city 
and return him to Virginia — Senator Bayard interrupted, and 
General Logan gave him a little attention. Said the General : 

I am glad that I gave the Senator an opportunity to repeat what he 
had said before. It only shows the feeling that there is in the heart. 
Sometimes when we have said hard and harsh things against a fellow- 
man, when we have cooling time we retract. If, after we have had 
cooling time, the bitterness of our heart only impels us to repeat it 
again, it only shows that there is deep-seated feeling there which can- 
not be uprooted by time. I gave the opportunity to the Senator to 
make his renewed attack on Sheridan. I will now say what I did not 
say before, — since he has repeated his remarks, — that his attack upon 
Sheridan, and his declaration that Sheridan is not Jit to breathe the free air of 
a republic, is an invitation to the White- Leaguers to assassinate him. If he 
is not fit to breathe the free air, he is not fit to live. If he is not fit to 
live, he is but fit to die. // is an invitation to them to perpetrate murder 
upon him. 

Now let me go further. I announce the fact here in this Chamber 
to-day, and I defy contradiction, that the Democracy in this Chamber 
have denounced Sheridan more, since this despatch was published, than 
they ever denounced Jeff. Davis and the whole rebellion during four 
years' war against the Constitution of this country. I dislike much to 



222 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

say these things ; but they are true, and as truth ought not to hurt, I 
will say them. 

What is your Democracy of Louisiana? You are excited; your 
extreme wrath is aroused at General Sheridan because he called your 
White-Leaguers, down there, "banditti." I ask you if the murder of 
thirty-five hundred men in a short time for political purposes, by a band 
of men banded together for the purpose of murder, does not make them 
"banditti," what it does make them ? 

Oh, what a crime it was in Sheridan to say that these men were 
banditti ! He is a wretch. From the papers, he ought to be hanged 
to a lamp-post ; from the Senators, he is not fit to breathe the free air 
of Heaven or of this republic ; but your murderers of thirty-five hun- 
dred people for political offences are fit to breathe the air of this country 
and are defended on this floor to-day, and are defended here by the Democratic 
Party ; and you cannot avoid or escape the proposition. You have 
denounced Republicans for trying to keep the peace in Louisiana ; you 
have denounced the Administration for trying to suppress bloodshed in 
Louisiana ; you have denounced all for the same purpose ; but not one 
word has fallen from the lips of a solitary Democratic Senator de- 
nouncing these wholesale murders in Louisiana. You have said, " I am 
sorry these things are done;" but you have defended White-Leaguers; 
you have defended Penn ; you have defended rebellion ; and _>'<?« stand 
here to-day the apologists of murder, of rebellion, and of treason in that State. 

Sir, we have been told that this old craft is rapidly going to pieces ; 
that the angry waves of dissension in the land are lashing against her 
sides. We are told that she is sinking, sinking, sinking to the bottom of 
the political ocean. Is that true ? Is it true that this gallant old party, 
that this gallant old ship that has sailed through troubled seas before, 
is going to be stranded now upon the rock of fury that has been set up 
by a clamor in this Chamber and a few newspapers in the country ? Is 
it true that the party that saved this country in all its great crises, in all 
its great trials, is sinking to-day, on account of its fear and trembling, 
before an inferior enemy? I hope not. I remember, sir, once I was 
told that the old Republican ship was gone ; but when I steadied my- 
self on the shores bordering the political ocean of strife and commo- 
tion, I looked afar off, and there I could see a vessel bounding the 
boisterous billows, with white sail spread, marked on her sides, 
11 Freighted with the hopes of mankind," while the great Mariner above, 
as her Helmsman, steered her, navigated her, to a haven of rest, of 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 223 

peace, and of safety. You have but to look again upon that broad 
ocean of political commotion to-day, and the time will soon come when 
the same old craft, freighted with the same cargo, will be seen, flying 
the same flag, passing through these tempestuous waves, anchoring 
herself at the shores of honesty and justice ; and there she will lie, un- 
disturbed by strife and tumult, again in peace and safety. 

PROPOSED TRANSFER OF THE INDIAN BUREAU TO THE WAR DE- 
PARTMENT SENATOR LOGAN ELOQUENTLY OPPOSES IT, AND 

PLEADS FOR INDIAN CIVILIZATION AND NATIONAL GOOD 
FAITH. 

On June 20, 1876, the Senate having under consideration 
an amendment of the Committee on Appropriations, — of 
which General Logan was a member, — to strike from the 
Indian appropriation bill the section transferring the charge 
of Indian affairs from the Interior Department to the War 
Department, as proposed by the House of Representatives, 
Senator Logan made a very strong speech against such trans- 
fer, showing an amount of close historical research and a 
breadth of humanitarianism that did honor equally to his 
head and heart. It is a speech that should be read by every 
one who desires to be accurately and thoroughly informed in 
the history of the treatment of the American Indian from the 
time of the old royal charters and patents of the colonies and 
provinces to the present. It was, besides this, a clear and 
logical and most able argument, proving beyond question that, 
the transfer of this Bureau of Indian Affairs from the De- 
partment of the Interior to the War Department would be a 
change from a peace policy to a war policy, which would re- 
sult not in civilizing the Indian but in exterminating him ; that, 
such a transfer of civil administration of the Government to 
the Military Department is contrary to the spirit of our in- 
stitutions and the fundamental principles upon which our 
Republic is based ; that, in the opinions of enlightened Chris- 
tians, philanthropists, and statesmen possessed of that knowl- 
edge of Indian character and Indian life which would make 



2 2 4 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

their opinions authoritative, such action as was proposed 
would be in fact an abandonment of the peace policy and of 
the hope of civilizing the Indian ; and further, by authentic 
citations from the early charters and the pledges made by 
Washington and his successors and by the ordinances of our 
Government from 1775 to the present, that it has always been 
the policy of this Government to civilize the Indian, and any 
departure from that policy would be an act of perfidy and bad 
faith. He also adduced statistics to prove that the Indians, 
instead of dying out, were slightly increasing, and that out of 
a total number of 275,000 Indians, 100,000 of them might al- 
ready be termed " civilized," 52,000 semi-civilized, and that 
44,000 of the entire number were engaged in agricultural pur- 
suits. " Sir," said he, "when I look at these statistics, which 
seem to mark the dawn of a brighter day for these savage 
tribes, and in the light of past history contemplate the effect 
of the passage of this bill, I grow faint and sick." And 
then, with cumulative force and eloquence, the Senator pro- 
ceeded : 

Will we dare to say, in the face of all these facts, — unsatisfactory as 
many experiments have been, when we look at the isolated facts, — that 
the Indians cannot be civilized ? Sir, it is too late in the day to express 
such an opinion as that, when the civilizing forces have already broken 
off from the mass more than half its bulk. 

I tell Senators, now, there is no political reputation in this ; there is 
no political clap-trap in proving to the country that you have no faith 
in civil authority. There is nothing to be gained by trying to convince 
the country that this must become a military despotism. The man who 
attempts to make himself a popular statesman by advocating military 
authority to rule over civil authority, fails to utter the voice of the 
American people. Sir, I have been a soldier many years of my life, and 
I love the position of a soldier. I was fond of it when I belonged to the 
army, but my belonging to the army never changed my education so far 
as governmental affairs were concerned. I have learned from history, by 
my reading from my childhood, that the downfall of governments was 
by putting power in military hands. I have learned that republics must 
and can only be maintained by civil authority, not by military. 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 



225 



Put the Indian Department under the War Department, the Pension 
Bureau next, the Land Office next, abolish the Interior Department 
next, and then you have got one-fourth of the Government under the 
charge of the military, and thus a long step taken toward the resump- 
tion of military authority in this country. Remember the voices of 
Clay and Webster, of the great statesmen in this land, against the usur- 
pations and inroads of military authority. It is a lesson that might 
well be learned, now, by men who are pluming themselves that they are 
becoming great statesmen. Sir, it is a lesson to be learned by the ris- 
ing and future generations ; for the time will never come that you will 
satisfy the honest people of this country by making them believe that 
they are not fit for civil government. I warn, now, the party that un- 
dertakes this step in politics as well as in civilization and the advance 
of Christianity in this country ; I warn the man of his future who does 
it ; for there is not an honest Christian in this land, be he of whatever 
politics he may, who does not abhor the idea of military government. 
He believes in peaceful means in bringing about civilization, and is 
willing to undertake it ; and do not deprive him of the opportunity. 

Mr. President, I have not examined in order to see, but am inclined 
to believe there is one space in our Centennial display which remains 
unoccupied : that is, an exhibit of the effect of our Indian policy dur- 
ing the past hundred years. There may be, and doubtless are, exhibits 
of Indian relics, implements, ornaments, trappings, etc., and there may 
be examples of their workmanship and evidences of their recent prog- 
ress in the arts of industry ; but, sir, I scarcely think we will find there 
a list of the tribes which once flourished on the soil we now occupy, but 
which have become extinct in consequence of our contact with them. I 
presume that we will not find exhibited there, the crimson pages of our 
history, stained by the blood of unnecessary Indian wars. I presume, 
sir, we will find, there, no display of the treaties so solemnly made, 
which have been ruthlessly broken in our anxiety to obtain their lands 
and appropriate their possessions. 

There may be antiquities to remind us of the days of William Penn, 
but we will scarcely find any tokens to call before us the war of the 
Everglades, and the history of the Seminoles. Sir, I fear, nay, I should 
rather say I rejoice, to think this space is left vacant, or filled with 
other things than those which belong there properly. 

Had I the time, and a list prepared, I would present in array one 
after another the numerous tribes that once flourished over our broad 
area, but have silently passed into oblivion before the irresistible prog- 
ress of civilization, with scarcely an effort on our part to save them 
from extinction. I would point you to a few miserable remnants of 
15 



22 6 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

tribes, who once sent terror through our borders, when provoked by 
unnecessary war and unwise action on our part. That some have met 
deserved fate, there is no doubt ; that horrid cruelties have darkened 
their history, cannot be denied ; but, sir, it was our mission to redeem 
them from savage life and elevate them in the scale of being for which 
they were formed. And, as we now stand upon the one hundredth 
annual round of our national existence and look down the vista of 
receding years can we contemplate the picture without a single pang 
of remorse ; can we say we have been faithfid to the trust reposed in us ? 

Sir, the record is made, the history is written, and, although much of 
it is crimsoned with unnecessary blood, it must stand ; it is beyond our 
power now to change it ; but the present and the future are not beyond 
reach. Let us then, in this matter, vindicate our right to the name 
"Christian nation," and let no false ideas of economy, in order to gain 
political capital, prevent us from doing our duty, and whole duty, as a 
nation, to these unfortunate and degraded people. 

One single item in the Commissioner's last report, small as it is, is 
sufficient in itself to justify our outlay on this Bureau ; that is, that the 
births exceed the deaths. It indicates that the tendency to extinction 
has ceased, and that, by wise measures and the civilizing process, the 
forces of decay may be checked. 

Why, sir, when I turn away from the sad picture of the past, and 
look forward to what the future of this people may be if the policy now 
adopted is properly sustained and the system for accomplishing the 
work thoroughly and wisely revised and placed on a proper footing, I 
feel a deep anxiety to have my name recorded as one of the advocates 
and defenders of this policy. As I look forward, and trace the history 
of the future, as the veil lifts year by year, and see one after another of 
the tribes gathered on suitable reservations and gradually, though 
slowly, learning the arts of husbandry, and the children gathered in the 
schoolrooms and gradually acquiring an education ; as I see the females, 
now beasts of burden, step by step acquiring their proper position in 
social life, — it binds my heart to my country by a new tie. As I lengthen 
my gaze, and look a little farther, I see waving fields of grain and happy 
homes where once roved the wild buffalo and wilder savages ; the chil- 
dren of these once savage hordes have grown into manhood and woman- 
hood ; they have taken on them the habiliments of civilization, and now 
no longer is the wild war-whoop heard from ocean to ocean, no longer 
is there need for a military post, scout, or soldier on our borders of 
civilization, for we have none save the ocean bounds, east and west, and 
national bounds, north and south. I catch one more glance before the 
vision fades, and I see these tribes, redeemed and Christianized, ad- 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 227 

mitted to all the rights of civilization and citizenship, and side by side 
in these halls sit their representatives ; and I listen in admiration while 
th it native eloquence, now educated and trained in all the arts of elo- 
cution and oratory, thrills with admiration the attentive audience. Sir, 
could I link my name with a measure which will result in this end, I 
would feel sure that it would live and endure while the rolls and records 
of time endure. 

logan's views on finance — non-taxability of bonds and 
notes — -the necessity for upholding the credit. 

In the course of a speech at Clinton, 111., October 10, 
1878, devoted to a thorough discussion of the financial ques- 
tion, General Logan said : 

It is true that Government bonds are not taxable, and it is equally 
true of the United States notes (or greenbacks) ; and why should they 
be taxed? Is it because the persons holding these obligations should be 
made to pay a tax, or is it that the obligation itself should be taxed ? If 
it is the obligation, as the Democrats say in platform and speeches, I say 
the law and reason for the same is against them. It is not that the 
holder of the bond or greenback is exempt from taxation as a class. 
That is not it, but that the credit of the Government is protected 
thereby. The Government, as well as having the consent of the peo- 
ple to its existence, must have credit. No Government can long exist 
without credit : without it the machinery cannot work ; without it the 
power to preserve itself is lost. Armies and navies would melt 
away ; without it, wars offensive and defensive must be abandoned, 
and Government would soon be disrupted. Your credit is the 
very life-blood of your nation. On it, you borrowed money, you sold 
your bonds, you put your notes in circulation, and now maintain them 
at nearly par. By your credit, you organized armies and navies and 
suppressed a rebellion, preserved your Nation intact, and gave that 
liberty to men to which they were entitled. This being so, can this, 
or any other Nation, allow States or municipalities to depreciate or 
cripple it by taxing the credit of the Sovereign power ? To permit a 
State to tax bonds or obligations of the Government, is to allow the 
State, the county, and the city, to attack the credit and the power under 
the Constitution to borrow money. This would place the power in 
States, that might be preparing for a secession from the Government, 
to depreciate the credit to such an extent that the Government would 
be powerless to protect itself. During our noble existence, as a Gov- 



22 8 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

ernment, this power has never been acknowledged, and at no time has 
the levy of a tax ever been permitted on any stock, certificates of in- 
debtedness, bonds, or currency of the Government; nor will any Gov- 
ernment accede to any such proposition. This attack upon the credit 
of the Nation is not of recent birth, and therefore our learned states- 
men should not claim a patent for it. At first blush it seems proper, 
until we consider the matter and see where it might carry us. I thought 
once, without examination of the question, that it might be done, and I 
say now to our opponents that then I was only as wise as they seem to 
be now. [Laughter.] In South Carolina, in 1829, prior to the attempt 
of Mr. Calhoun and his adherents to establish a Southern Confederacy, 
they made an attack upon the credit of the Nation by levying a tax 
upon the stock and indebtedness of the Government, which was largely 
held in that part of the country. A tax was laid upon stock of the Gov- 
ernment held by a Mr. Weston. He took the case to the United States 
Supreme Court. Chief-Justice Marshall, one of the brightest legal 
lights that ever adorned the bench, delivered the opinion of the Court, 
and in this case of Weston vs. The City of Charleston, Chief-Justice 
Marshall says : " A tax on Government stock is thought by this court 
to be a tax on the contract, a tax on the power to borrow money on the 
credit of the United States, and consequently repugnant to the Consti- 
tution." And since this decision there have been four other cases de- 
cided, where the question arose on the taxing of Government bonds, 
and also on United States notes (or greenbacks), and it has been uni- 
versally held that the credit of the Government was not subject to taxa- 
tion. In the last case, decided at the December Term, 1868, Chief- 
Justice Chase delivered the opinion, and declared "greenbacks," as they 
are called, not subject to taxation, being obligations of the Government. 
Now, I would like to understand, with all these decisions of the Supreme 
Court on the subject, and the reasons for them, how it is that a party, 
or any man, claiming to treat the people fairly in discussing this sub- 
ject, can have the face to take the position assumed in favor of taxing 
the credit of the Government. And now we say to them, in answer to 
their arraignment on this point, that the Republican Party stands by 
the precedents of all civilized and commercial nations in the preserva- 
tion of their credit ; we stand by the uniform precedents of our own 
country on this question ; we stand by the numerous decisions of the 
Supreme Court — Democratic, Whig, and Republican — on this question ; 
and that finally we stand, as it were, like a great wall between the credit 
of the Nation, and the demagogues who would now assail and destroy 
it. [Great applause.] The next assault is made on the Republican 
Party on account of the National Banking system. It is proposed to 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 



229 



wipe it out of existence without giving us any well-matured plan as a 
substitute. We all know that some system of banking will be carried 
on. Commercial countries cannot get along without banks in some 
form, as a convenience to trade. For seven centuries this business has 
been carried on. When we had the Democratic system of banks, 
although in this State based upon bonds, they were found to be unre- 
liable and unsafe. Our currency was not stable or in anyway reliable. 
It was not suited to our condition. During the war, the system of 
National Banks was established, the currency to be based upon our 
bonds, for security and protection to the bill-holder. The bills of these 
banks have ever been as good as United States notes, and as secure and 
reliable for all practical purposes. They were established to aid the 
Government and the people. They will be a great aid in keeping 
all our circulating currency at par in coin when specie payments are 
once resumed. With their notes redeemable in United States notes, 
and United States notes in coin, we will be able to float nearly twice 
the amount of currency at par that we could with the whole floated as 
Government notes redeemable in coin at the Treasury. 

THE FOOTPRINTS OF PARTIES ON THE AVENUES OF TIME WORDS 

OF LIVING LIGHT. 

In the same great speech, the following strikingly earnest 
and eloquent passages at once rivet attention and carry con- 
viction to the mind : 

Have we a government or not ? If we have, then it is a fixed and 
stable government ? And, if we have a government fixed, stable, and 
good, shall it be preserved ? [Voices : "Yes, yes."] Shall we keep it ? 
Shall we suffer ourselves to be drawn away from that which is good, by 
the vagaries of men without reason or judgment? Prior to the year 
i860, my countrymen, this Government was in the control of men whom 
we cannot call its friends ; and when I say this, I do not mean either 
the loyal Democrats or the loyal Nationalists, but I mean that element 
of our population which has always advocated the sovereignty of the 
State as superior to the sovereignty of the Nation. To-day we are pre- 
sented with rather an alarming spectacle. Notwithstanding the fact of 
the great preponderance in population and means contributed to the 
support of the Government by that section of the country which re- 
mained loyal to it, we find the reins of government gradually moving 
into the hands, not of the loyal Democrats, nor of the loyal Nation- 
alists, but of the very men who made war against it and did their ut- 



230 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



most to destroy it. People may call me prejudiced if they will ; they 
may declare me wrong ; but I cannot escape the feeling that the man 
who loved his country, and battled for it in the hour of danger, is a 
safer man to trust with its care, than the one who hated and sought to 
uproot and overturn it. [Great applause, and voices crying, "That's 
the doctrine."] The loyal people of the North, the honest men,— Re- 
publican, Democrat, and Nationalist alike, — have it in their power to 
control our affairs to the end of keeping the Government in the care and 
ward of those who will certainly preserve and perpetuate the union of 
the American States. [Cheers.] It is a matter they should seriously 
consider ; for if it is again placed under the power of those who never 
had any belief in it, no man can forecast the result. 

In this emergency I appeal to the young men of the country to look 
well to the future. Let them examine men and measures with the ut- 
most care. Let them consider the men who have stood by the Gov- 
ernment in its hours of danger, and compare with them those who are 
seeking to inaugurate new policies. Let them compare men in public 
life as they compare men in private life, and let them compare par- 
ties as they compare their neighbors. Let them look to the record of 
parties as the guarantees of conduct, just as they look to the records 
of individuals. When a party was in power, what was its record ? What 
was its history ? — for it certainly has one written indelibly upon the 
page of events. Everything makes a history, and marks out a path as 
it passes down the avenues of time. It has been beautifully said that 
the plant and the pebble are both attended by their own shadows. The 
drop of water falling from the clouds leaves its imprint upon the sand, 
and the stone which rolls from the mountain-top scratches its course to 
the very bottom. The mighty river, as it flows majestically along, marks 
the banks which hedge it, and leaves the imprint of its torrent upon the 
rocks which intercept its course. In every aspect in which we view 
the works of Nature, we find them leaving their own history for the 
benefit of the future. 

So it is with parties of men. The party in this country which pre- 
ceded the Republican Party, came into being, passed over the stage of 
public life, and made a public record. What was it ? It is written on 
the credit of our country, on its energies, on its good name. It moved 
along, and made a track through cities, over prairies, across rivers, down 
railroads, along the streams, over the lakes, and upon the bosom of the 
mighty ocean ; and wherever that track was made it can be seen to-day. 
The stain of human blood is upon it. And when you view the move- 
ment of the party which has thus made its record, you will find it 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 231 

attended, like the pebble and the plant, with its own shadow— a shadow 
which casts itself forebodingly into the future. [Loud applause.] 

How has it been with the Republican Party, my friends ? What has 
marked its pathway ? Examine it during its various periods. Examine 
it when it sprang into existence, as the child from the lap of Liberty ; 
then during its maturity, when it stood before the nations as the advo- 
cate and dispenser of human freedom and of justice. Mark how it 
sustained the good name and credit of the Government during the se- 
verest ordeal to which a nation was ever subjected. Follow its course, 
and you will find that it has fulfilled every promise, and measured up to 
every obligation. All along the pathway of this remarkable organiza- 
tion we find, where thistles once grew, flowers and roses now blossom. 
As compared with the parties of the past, it will go down to history as 
the party of patriots who loved their native land, and having saved it 
by bravery from destruction, exhibited their wisdom and sagacity in 
those essentials of statesmanship which go hand in hand with patriotism. 
[Great applause.] 

All human beings are liable to error, and it would be strange indeed 
if the Republican Party had been free of error and mistakes. But it 
can point proudly to the fact of having been quick to perceive its 
mistakes, and no less quick to mend them. Now, when a party has 
proven itself faithful to the integrity of the nation, faithful to its flag, 
faithful to its glory, and faithful to the spirit of our free institutions, let 
me ask you what wisdom there is in putting it aside for the purpose of 
making a dangerous experiment with an untried party, or with a party 
that, having once been tried, has proven itself worse than a failure ? 
Why is it, I ask, that our people contemplate the perpetration of so 
great a folly? It must certainly arise from a spirit of change and 
unrest, dangerous to the last degree. Believe me, fellow-citizens, it is 
better to adopt the maxim, "Let well enough alone," and it is better 
to trust those who are tried than those who pretend. I am no alarmist, 
my friends, but I fully believe that our Nation is now undergoing a 
test which must decide whether it will be permanent enough. To you 
is committed this great question ; and believe me, my friends, when I 
say that you can do no better than trust our young Republic to the 
party which has proven itself a kind mother, a brave defender, and the 
wisest of all counsellors. [The speaker retired amid long-continued 
cheers.] 



2 „ 2 LIFE OF LOGAN. 



THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN REAL AND REPRESENTATIVE MONEY 
AND " FIAT MONEY" A PERTINENT STORY. 

In another great speech at Van Wert, O., September 2, 

1879, devoted almost wholly to Finance, General Logan 

also said : 

The Democrats, and Greenbackers, say that the Republican Party 
does not understand the nature of our Greenback currency, and they 
propose to take charge of it themselves, and see that the people are 
posted. When the Greenbacks were first issued, some people said they 
were worthless rags, etc. Now, however, they so love them that they 
are determined to have them strewn out of the window of the Treasury 
with a pitchfork, so that anyone can have as many as he wants ; and, 
strange to say, whenever we speak of the opposition to Greenbacks in 
former days, and the affection for them now, the Democracy think we 
are shooting at them. [Laughter.] Their conduct in this particular 
reminds me of a friend who refused to attend church for many years, 
because, he said, the minister preached politics. One Sabbath, how- 
ever, he was prevailed on to go with a lady relative. During the ser- 
mon the minister quoted the language, " The wicked shall be turned 
into hell, with all the nations that forget God." This gentleman left 
the church at once. When the lady relative returned to his house, she 
inquired why he left church. He said he would not listen to a po- 
litical sermon. The lady replied, " I did not hear any politics." He 
replied, "Did he not say 'The wicked shall be turned into hell, with 
all the Nations that forget God' ? " The lady replied, " Yes, but what 
of that ?" "Why," said he, "if he did not mean the Democratic Party, 
who the devil did he mean?" [Prolonged laughter.] Now I do not 
want my Democratic and Greenback friends to get themselves so mixed 
that they will not understand who is meant. [Laughter.] But, my 
friends, the Greenback proposed to-day by our opponents — the fiat 
currency, without the promise of the Government to pay,— is not the 
Greenback of the Republican Party. The Greenback of the Repub- 
lican Party is the one that contains the pledge and good faith of the 
Government as to the volume to be issued ; it is the one that contains 
a promise to pay ; the one that the Supreme Court says is an obligation 
of the Government to pay in coin of the United States of a quantity 
and fineness authenticated by the stamp of the Government. This is 
our Greenback, and we have kept every pledge of the Government in 
connection with it. My countrymen, the Republican Greenback came 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 



233 



forth amid storm and confusion, with a promise upon its face, and the 
hope and faith of the Nation bearing it along to the performance of 
a great work, and, in obedience to our legislation, on the first day of 
January last, it walked to the foot of the hill, and there, standing in 
the presence of the gold and silver which glistened upon its summit, 
did say, " I am here in accordance with the promise of the Republican 
Party, that I shall be made equal in value with coin of a metallic 
ring, and I demand that it be done " — and it has been done. [Great 
applause.] 

Now, my friends, let us glance for a moment at the basis upon which 
rests the whole theory of what is called the Greenback creed ; improperly 
so called, however, as the Greenback belongs to the Republican Party 
by patent right, and the use of its name in designation of a spurjous 
article is as unwarranted as it is dishonest. But the basis of the Green- 
back creed, that which underlies the main structure, as well as its various 
wings and additions, — and this, too, whether promulgated in the plat- 
forms of the National Party, or the Democratic Party, or in their cam- 
paign documents, or by their speakers on the stump, — is the simple as- 
sertion that a government has the power to create money. Now you 
will observe that there is a broad distinction between the creation of 
actual, or real, money, and the creation of representative money. Gov- 
ernments can create representative money, and every civilized govern- 
ment of the world probably does so at this day. But mark the differ- 
ence between real money, and representative money. Real money, is 
something which has an exchangeable value among all commercial na- 
tions, and long usage has constituted the precious metals the materials 
of which it shall be made. Representative money, is something which 
represents real money. 

Gold and silver are the metals which, by universal consent, are used 
as the standards of value. And being so recognized, they have an in- 
herent worth — that is, the value lies within the thing itself. Now paper, 
not being the standard of value, has no inherent worth, no matter what 
devices may be printed or engraved upon it. And when governments 
issue notes, for convenience of handling and safety against loss by rob- 
bery, etc., they can only have a value in so far as they represent the 
recognized standard of value. Take that standard from behind them, 
and they are only bits of paper. Hence you see it is impossible to 
create money out of nothing. A man may give you his note of hand, 
promising to pay a certain sum by a certain date, but his note is valu- 
able to you only as it represents an ability and disposition to pay that 
which is recognized as money by your neighbors and will be taken by 
them in exchange for articles which you need. But the Greenback 



234 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



theory proposes to take away the representative character of the bill or 
note entirely, and declare that a certain piece of paper is a dollar de 
facto. They declare that the fiat of the Government is potent to give 
inherent value to a thing which the world around us has said possesses 
none. Of all the schemes for an inflated currency which have ever been 
originated by the nations of the past and present generations, this has 
the least merit and safety under it. Even the South-Sea bubble, which 
involved such wide-spread ruin, as well as the assignat heresy of after- 
years, had each a representative value to commend them to the people. 
But our friends of the irredeemable-Greenback persuasion have such 
faith in the power of the Government to do anything it chooses, that 
they believe if it puts a declaration upon a piece of blank paper like 
this, for a thousand dollars, it must be so. Divinity itself could scarcely 
go further. 

My friends, I could make this thing so perfectly ridiculous, if I de- 
sired to take your time, that it would be very laughable ; but I will not. 

I will, however, say right here, that if we all desire to be honest, one 
with another, the way to be honest is to demand honesty of the Gov- 
ernment. Let your Government be honest, and let your citizens be 
honest. Learn to adopt the same rule. Then if you want to be honest, 
have honest money, and you will have honest dealings. Let your money 
have a fixed value, whether gold, silver, or paper ; let it all be of the 
same value, having the same purchasing power, and then nobody will 
be cheated. Whenever you make money not redeemable in coin, or 
whenever you make it of any character not having a standard purchasing 
power, you cheat somebody. Any person who holds such a dollar, when 
the time comes to make a change, — to make its value equal with others 
of higher value, — is defrauded, because the holder has something which 
is then worth less in money, or which has not the full value of a dollar, 
so that somebody must be cheated. 

It reminds me a good deal of an old farmer, who had studied finance 
for years. When this Greenback question came up in Congress, he 
wrote to his representative in Congress, stating that he had been a 
Democrat, and a Whig, and everything, and had studied all the systems 
of finance. Said he, " I have been a hard-money Democrat," — just like 
all those Democrats have been, — "then I got to be a soft-money Demo- 
crat," — just like most of our Democrats have got to be ; " but," said he, 
" after trying that a while, to write you the plain, honest truth, I have 
come to the conclusion that the only way to have a dollar is to have 
a hundred cents in it, and then nobody is cheated." [Laughter.] And 
that is the only way. Three pecks of wheat never made a bushel, in 
the world, and the man that buys three pecks for a bushel is cheated 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 235 

always. So it is with your money. Eighty cents never was a dollar ; 
eighty-five cents never was a dollar ; and ninety cents never was. It 
takes one hundred cents to make a dollar, in either paper-currency, 
silver, or gold. 

A COINCIDENCE GENERAL LOGAN AGAIN ELECTED TO THE U. S. 

SENATE GREAT REJOICINGS OVER IT, EVERYWHERE — HIS WEL- 
COME TO CARBONDALE GRAND WELCOME BACK TO WASHING- 

T0N — senator logan's great speech at the national 

CAPITAL HIS FIRST ACT, ON RETURNING TO THE SENATE, IS 

IN BEHALF OF THE OLD SOLDIERS. 

It is rather a curious coincidence, that, within the same 
twenty-four hours, General Logan was renominated by the 
Republican caucus for United States Senator of Illinois, and 
the Arrearages of Pensions Bill got through both Houses of 
Congress. A Chicago paper of January 16, 1879, thus 
alludes to the latter event. 

The bill for the payment of arrearages of pensions passed the Senate 
yesterday, and thus, unless disapproved by the President, which is very 
improbable, becomes a law. The passage of the bill will bring joy to 
the hearts of the thousands of pensioners, widows of soldiers, and their 
children, throughout the country. It is a measure that General Logan 
has labored for years to have enacted, both in the House and Senate, 
and its final passage is largely owing to the good work he did for it in 
its incipiency. 

General Logan was re-elected to the United States Senate, 
January 22, 1879. While the Senatorial contest was pending, 
and looking doubtful, Republican papers from one end of the 
land to the other, representing the interest their supporters 
felt in the issue of the struggle, spoke highly of his services 
in that body, and expressed a hope that he would be re- 
elected. The Albia, la., Union, January 2, 1879, said : " The 
whole country is taking a lively interest in the selection of 
the next U. S. Senator from Illinois ; and well it may, for it 
is a matter which concerns the whole country." Said the 



22,6 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

Burlington, la., Hawkcye : " The exigencies of the times re- 
quire the presence of men like Major-General John A. Logan 
in the Senate." The same paper also said: "The Inter- 
Ocean makes a good point when it says that the election of 
General Logan will have an excellent effect both on the 
Northern Republicans, and Southern bulldozers. It will en- 
courage the former to believe that the day of the negative 
politician is over, while it will give the latter to understand 
that while the South is putting her Wade Hamptons forward, 
the North proposes to meet them with timber every bit as 
tough and wiry, and, in short, to give them, at every turn, a 
Roland for an Oliver. The country has had enough nega- 
tive men. While Northern sentimentalism has sent a few 
negative men to the front, the South has called its Ben Hills, 
Hamptons, Butlers, Gordons, and other positive, earnest Con- 
federate leaders to look after its interests in the National 
Government." This is a fair sample of the remarks of Re- 
publican papers everywhere. Of course, Illinois itself was 
stirred to its very depths — nowhere more than in Egypt, as 
the following lines, expressing the current feeling there, will 
tend to show : 

LOGAN. 

BY AN EGYPTIAN FARMER. 

When from the halls of Congress flew 
Part of Democracy's grim crew, 
And swore the Union's strongest band 
Was but a rope of crumbling sand, 
The North a while, in deep suspense, 
Awaited their returning sense : 
Vain phantom, baseless, empty bliss — 
He waits in vain who waits on this ! 

But when along our Southern sky 
Their alien flag was seen to fly, 
A few brave hearts, and strong, and true, 
Stood faithful, in this faithless crew ; 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 237 

Then Logan spake the thrilling word 
Which all the Sons of Egypt heard, 
And thronging hosts with martial tramp 
Went marching to their country's camp. 

This gallant man, as by a spell, 
Those thronging thousands followed well ; 
And all his comrades at the front — 
When war waged fiercer than its wont, 
And shook the earth and throbbed the air — 
Knew Logan and his men were there. 

Eighteen long years have flung their chime 
Along the corridors of time : 
This crew returns ; the frosts of age, 
And Logan's steel, have cooled their rage. 
Shall these come back to rule the State, 
And gallant men like Logan wait ? 
On war's grim field he met this crew ; 
In Congress let him meet them too ! 
The hosts that saved our flag declare 
That Logan too should meet them there. 

His re-election, in view of the heavy fight made against 
him, was a great personal victory, and Republican news- 
papers everywhere expressed their gratification and that of 
the country thereat. Even papers abroad joined in the ac- 
claim. Said the American Trader, London, England, Feb- 
ruary 15, 1879 : 

The election of General Logan to the United States Senate from 
Illinois has, in view of the menacing attitude of the " Solid South," a 
deep political meaning, as indicating the Northern spirit which the re- 
constructed States will encounter when, with the aid of their ancient 
Democratic allies, they control legislation in both Houses of Congress. 
In a larger degree than any other American, Senator Logan possesses 
in his character and record the principles and feelings which won the 
martyred Lincoln the enlightened trust of all Union-loving patriots. 
. . . That the feeling of the white political class of the Southern States 
is unsubdued and bitterly hostile cannot be denied, all senseless and un- 
worthy as it is ; and until better counsels possess their leaders, vigilance 
sharpened by experience will be requisite in Congress if the country is 



238 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

to be spared another civil war. Revenge still lives in hearts that should 
be filled with gratitude for unexampled leniency ; enormous war-claims, 
as the Confederate debt, are to be pressed for payment, the army dis- 
banded or quite abolished — these are the dangers which threaten the 
Nation at the hands of men who do not love but hate the Union they 
are forced to live in. But the presence of one in their midst whom they 
fear and can never again deceive ; who knows all their arts and intents, 
and whom the past has taught them to respect — will make them pause 
when plotting vengeance or for mastery. Republics are reputed ungrate- 
ful ; but it is a hopeful sign when services such as General Logan has 
rendered are fittingly rewarded, as have been his in this second call by 
his State to her highest honors ; and his countrymen will repose in con- 
fidence that all is well at Washington when the tried soldier is on guard. 

Invited to address the Legislature of Illinois, in joint 
convention, after his re-election, he did so in a speech in 
which he dwelt emphatically upon the duty of the Govern- 
ment to protect all its citizens everywhere, in a similar strain 
to that in which he afterward spoke in Washington ; and 
declared that "the Republicans will stand by the proposition 
that all paper currency shall be convertible into coin at the 
option of the holder, now and in the future." On February 
9th he paid a flying visit to his old home in the village of 
Carbondale. Its population is but 2,500 people, yet upon 
his arrival there, " 3,000 were waiting to greet him." In the 
Inter- Ocean account, it is stated that "his stanch old 
Egyptian friends by the thousand had resolved to congrat- 
ulate him upon his recent proud victory. The outpouring 
of the people was not confined to political parties. There 
were hundreds of Stalwart Democrats and scores of Green- 
backers. All wanted to see John A. Logan, their old friend." 
It was an affecting and immense ovation. So also at Wash- 
ington, upon his return, he was received with a salute of 
thirty-seven guns, taken in charge by a distinguished recep- 
tion committee, seated in a carriage of honor drawn by four 
white horses, and escorted by a grand procession, in a blaze 
of pyrotechnic lights, to Willard's, where other thousands 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 



239 



renewed the welcome with protracted cheers. It was a most 
imposing demonstration, and fitly typified at the Nation's 
capital the joy which animated every patriotic heart to its 
remotest borders. And the response which he made to the 
address of welcome was no less notable and stirring for its 
eloquence, its patriotism, and statesmanship. Said he : 

Travel-worn by the journey from my home in the far Northwest to 
the cherished capital of our Nation, I feel unable adequately to express 
the gratitude and enthusiasm with which this distinguished mark of 
your esteem has inspired me ; but let me say to you, my countrymen, 
friends, and former comrades-in-arms, my heart beats in unison with 
yours in all that pertains to our common humanity and to our common 
citizenship ; and I here renew the vow which I made upon my first 
entrance into public life — to devote myself to the great interests of the 
people, and look for my best reward in the simple knowledge that I 
have been true to those interests and have done something toward 
promoting them. [Applause.] 

When I look upon that magnificent building, my fellow-citizens, 
which the American people have reared as the emblem of their 
country's greatness, and beneath whose shadows we are standing 
to-night, I remember that the beautiful marbles and huge limestones of 
which it is largely composed are made up of minute animals whose 
lives were passed in the dim perspective of the world's early morning, 
who strutted their brief hour across the stage of life, and in dying left 
their shells as the lasting contribution of each infinitesimal creature 
toward the formation of the eternal rocks ; and now, after the birth of 
many, many centuries, and the death of ages, every one of these little 
prototypes that bathed in the waters of seas which mortal eyes have 
never seen, but of whose existence the man of science finds ample 
demonstration, is represented in that imposing pile which marks the 
last and best achievement of our race — a government of the people. 
[Cheers.] And, fellow-citizens, no higher ambition can any of us have 
than the work typified by the life and death of the little shell-fish of the 
ancient seas. If in our lives we can contribute a single atom to the 
great temple of human freedom and progress, we shall have left foot- 
prints of our existence which the march of all the coming centuries 
will not be potent to obliterate. 

Twenty-one years ago I entered the Lower House of Congress as 
the Representative of a district of my native State whose people were 
strongly indoctrinated with the then creed of the Democratic Party. 



240 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

Reared in those principles myself, they were the inheritance from my 
political parentage, and I accepted them as the pupil does the axioms 
of his teachers. I have sometimes been taunted by adversaries with 
this early record, but I now leave to you as impartial judges whether 
I have not kept abreast of the wonderful events and progress of the 
times produced by Republican ideas. [Loud cheering.] 

Twenty years, fellow-citizens, make astounding changes in the his- 
tory of the human race. The old doctrine that the sun went around 
the earth was suddenly stranded upon the shores of error in greatly less 
than twenty years. The conception and achievement of the steam-en- 
gine, which has so revolutionized industry, travel, and comfort, were 
hardly separated by the period of twenty years. The bold thought of 
Morse to capture the lightning was followed by the very act of har- 
nessing the destructive steed for the use of man, in less than twenty 
years. The step from the Declaration in Independence Hall, to the 
achievement at Yorktown, was accomplished in less than half of twenty 
years. And it remained for a period of four short years— though these 
were crowded with events the most momentous ever compressed within 
a time so brief— that period, fellow-citizens, embraced between the firing 
of a gun at Fort Sumter in April, 1861, and the surrender of a sword at 
Appomattox in 1865 — to ratify the principle proclaimed in 1776, that 
"all men are created equal," and give it practical existence, by strik- 
ing the chains from the bleeding limbs of four million bondmen. 
[Cheering.] 

The human mind does not revolve, but progresses in a straight line 
toward the great centre of ultimate perfection ; and in twenty years the 
milestones upon the highway of progress vanish to the rear with light- 
ning rapidity. The accepted thing of to-day, is improved to-morrow, 
and both become antiquated next year. Nation has succeeded nation, 
in the history of the world, and government has followed government. 
Evolution has been a living principle, running through all ages, and 
has brought communities from the original relations of tribes, through 
the many forms of government, to the latest and noblest offspring of 
time — our own free America. 

But we must not flatter ourselves that we have nearly reached per- 
fection of government. We must go forward, and take no backward 
step. There are those who denounce progress ; there are those who 
would abolish free schools ; there are those who would degrade labor ; 
who would obliterate the doctrine of human equality before the law 
from the statutes of an enlightened nation, who would gladly return 
to the day of sceptred power, and strike down the rule of the common 
people. It is this fear, fellow-citizens, that has prompted the people to 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 2 4I 

place themselves upon the ramparts of their own rights, and their 
guards upon the watch-tower. [Applause.] 

To be a representative, in the National Senate, of a commonwealth 
at this time only third as regards population and wealth in a nation ad- 
mittedly in advance of any other ; to assist in making laws for a people 
enlightened, wise, and virtuous — is certainly an honor of which any 
man may be proud. To the fellow-citizens of my own State I am pro- 
foundly grateful for the mark of confidence and esteem signalized by 
my re-election to the responsible position I have heretofore held ; and 
to you, fellow-citizens of Washington City and other localities, who, by 
your demonstration to-night, have ratified the act of my immediate 
neighbors, I am likewise profoundly grateful. 

I see many of my Illinois friends here to-night — gentlemen who 
have been intimately connected with me in the effort to advance the 
best interests of our State and Nation ; and I wish to say that, while we 
are determined to know no sectional divisions in this great country, 
our people are ever ready to lay their lives upon the altar of national 
honor, unity, and equality, — to contribute millions, if need be, to save 
the lives of pestilence-stricken citizens of other States. 

I see here also various worthy representatives of labor. All legiti- 
mate interests should be fostered ; and labor, which is the work upon 
which is built our national wealth and power, should be protected in all 
the rights which belong to it, and elevated to a recognized position of 
honor and dignity. [Applause.] We are a nation of laborers, a com- 
munity of toilers. We should have no class interests inimical to the 
general good in this free country; but, recognizing our National de- 
pendence, we should earnestly endeavor to advance the interests of each 
and every member of our National family. 

To you, my friends, the soldiers and sailors of our country, who have 
stood in the deadly breach, and faced the iron hail of treason, I must say 
a few words in conclusion. We need no introduction ; we have been com- 
rades-in-arms ; we have shared and faced dangers together in defence 
of our country. As a soldier I never did a worthy act that my fellow- 
soldiers did not unselfishly applaud. There are no politicians among 
you. Honor and merit are the standards by which you judge your fel- 
lows, and the humblest private that ever stood up in defence of his 
country's cause is the peer of the wisest statesman. I am proud to have 
been one of you, and to receive this recognition at your hands. Com- 
rades, I greet you with all the enthusiasm of a fellow-soldier. 

But, my friends, my remarks have grown to a greater length than 

they should. I must hasten. [Cries of "Go on ! "] We are ploughing 

over the sea of progress. It would be strange, indeed, if there were no 
16 



24 2 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

rocks to avoid, no shallows to wade. Grave issues will be before the 
country. We must try to find their best solution. I despise the narrow 
idea of locality. I know no boundary-lines except those beyond which 
the title of American citizen is lost. 

I will go as far as any man can properly go to accomplish unity and 
fraternity among the people of the States, but I will not consent to the 
crucifying of the National life upon the stunted tree of State Sovereignty. 
[Loud cheering.] 

My friends, we now see our country again beginning to march on 
the road of prosperity. There are certain things we should all stand by, 
and insist upon : 

First. That specie resumption must be maintained, — honest money 
alike for the poor and the rich. [Cheers.] 

Second. That provision should be made to forever bar claims against 
the Government — of any and all persons not positively and openly favor- 
ing the Union — for damages, supplies taken, etc., during the rebellion. 

Third. That every citizen owes to his Government his best efforts 
for his protection and preservation against foreign and domestic ene- 
mies, and that the Government is bound to give such protection as it 
can to its citizens on land and sea, at home and abroad ; and when 
political rights are guaranteed under our Constitution, there should be 
no distinction made — those guaranteed to one being as sacred as those 
guaranteed to another— between white or black, rich or poor, in Illi- 
nois or South Carolina. [Cheering.] And where the authorities of a 
State are powerless, or where they refuse to protect citizens or com- 
munities against armed mobs, while attempting to exercise such politi- 
cal rights as have been granted them, it is the duty of the Government 
to use such powder as it possesses to protect these citizens in the exer- 
cise of such rights. 

These propositions I propose to stand by, come what will. [Cheers.] 

A fain, my friends, I thank you, one and all, for this flattering demon- 
stration, and I assure you that it is responded to by my heart of hearts, 
with one regret — which is, that the full depths of my appreciation can- 
not find more eloquent utterance. [Continued applause.] 

Scarcely had he taken his old seat in the United States 
Senate, than he again introduced a bill for the equalization 
of bounties for soldiers of the war. The Massac Journal, 
March 29, 1879, thus referred to it: 

Senator Logan has introduced a bill into the United States Senate 
for the equalization of bounties. This is Logan's pet measure, which 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 243 

was once vetoed by President Grant. It is a measure of such manifest 
justice that it ought to become a law without unnecessary delay. Logan 
deserves well of soldiers and their friends. He is always ready and will- 
in? to do what he can for their relief. 

senator logan's great speech, in 1879, on the army 

appropriation bill his brave words and solemn 

warning to the revolutionary democracy. 

The failure of the Forty-fifth Congress to make appro- 
priations for the army, and for legislative, executive, and 
judicial purposes, made it necessary to call the Forty-sixth 
Congress together in extra or special session. In the Forty- 
fifth Congress, the House of Representatives was Demo- 
cratic, the Senate Republican. It was known that the next 
Senate would be Democratic as well as the House. A horde 
of hungry Democrats looked longingly upon the patronage 
of the Senate, which in time would be theirs, and resolved to 
hasten the day when they could seize it. It was from this 
quarter first came the suggestions of the revolutionary fight 
made in the House. They knew that, if appropriations 
failed, an extra session must be called — and with that would 
come the coveted offices. Their success in this respect was 
complete. Meanwhile, however, some of the Democratic 
leaders, getting interested in the revolutionary work, warmed 
themselves up into the belief that they were occupying high 
constitutional ground — that they were imitating the patriot- 
ism of the commons of England in their memorable contests 
with royal prerogative — and actually persuaded their political 
consciences that this would prove a popular course, and a 
winning issue for them, in the ensuing Presidential campaign. 
That issue, as stated by Senator Thurman for the Demo- 
cratic Party, whose candidate perhaps he would have liked 
to be, was this : " We claim the right, which the House of 
Commons in England established after two centuries of con- 
test, to say that we will not grant the money of the people 
unless there is a redress of grievances." 



244 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



The House and Senate got into a deadlock on the Demo- 
cratic plan of redressing these imaginary grievances, and so 
the appropriations for the support of the Government failed, 
and the extra session ensued. The result of this extra ses- 
sion was that the Democrats got the Senate offices, but 
owing to the gallant fight made, in both House and Senate, 
against the Democratic revolutionists, they were ultimately 
forced to abandon their revolutionary programme. In this 
memorable legislative fight, Senator Logan, — who, having 
been re-elected to the United States Senate vice Oglesby, had 
taken his seat March 18, 1879 — distinguished himself in a tell- 
ing speech (April 15, 1879) on the Army Appropriation Bill — 
a speech which presented a singularly clear analysis of the 
relations of the army to the civil power of the Government, 
as well as a strong denunciation of the mischievous and 
unconstitutional and revolutionary nature of the Democratic 
attempt to force Executive approval, of their obnoxious 
"riders" upon appropriation bills, under the threat of 
otherwise withholding appropriations. In that speech, Sen- 
ator Logan said : 

I cannot but regard the question which has arisen from this first 
move of the Democratic Party, upon their re-establishment in power, 
looking to the grasping of the Government, as absolutely the most im- 
portant as well as the most vital question which has presented itself as 
a menace to our Government since the year 1861, when the same senti- 
ment, as well as many of the same men, aimed a blow at the integrity 
of our country. . . . 

The people are the sovereigns of our country, and that measure 
which cannot go before them on its merits, and abide the time and 
manner of their decision, is weak, probably bad, and almost certainly 
in the interest of the few, as against the interest of the many. Look 
for a moment, sir, at the history of this measure, which proposes legis- 
lation of the most radical character. At no period of its history has the 
measure appeared in the form of independent legislation. Originally 
introduced into the last House, when the Senate was Republican in its 
majority, the evident purpose was to compel the Senate's acquiescence 
in a proposition which, as a measure appealing to their judgment and 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 



2 45 



sense of right, they could not indorse. Now that the majority of the 
Senate has become Democratic, it is again before Congress with 
the expectation that the Senate in passing it will assist in influencing the 
last obstacle to its success — the Presidential scrutiny. Plainly enough 
this course implies compulsion ; unusual and unrecognized methods of 
accomplishment, as well as fear to abide by the test of inherent merit. 
Note the violent circumstances, so to speak, under which it was forced 
upon the last Congress : parliamentary rules providing that no legisla- 
tion should be affixed to appropriation bills unless not only germane to 
the subject, but likewise retrenching in character, must be overridden, 
rendered useless and nugatory, in order to force this character of legis- 
lation upon the country. I have no desire to criticise the purposes of- 
any legislator in the discharge of his functions, but I draw attention to 
this point as tending to show the determination to consummate this 
piece of proposed legislation against time, against argument, against 
the co-operative branches of the Government, and against the people, 
who, it must be presumed, are not to be trusted with the decision of 
this question. 

Now, sir, I say the methods by which this legislation is attempted 
are bad upon their face, and argue in convincing terms against its pro- 
priety. . . . 

Our Government is one of co-ordinate powers which have mutual 
duties, independent responsibilities, and separate checks one upon the 
other. If one branch of the Government takes away the freedom of 
action of the others, it usurps the powers, privileges, and functions of 
the whole. Now, sir, this constitutes coercion, of the boldest, rankest 
kind. The measure being coercive, is certainly against the spirit of the 
Constitution, and, being so, is revolutionary to the last degree. The 
logic of this conclusion is so inevitable as to permit no outlet for escape. 
In the debate which had taken place on this bill, instances were adduced 
in sufficient number to show most convincingly how either House of 
Congress, by a refusal to perform its constitutionally prescribed duties, 
or by performing them in a manner not contemplated by the framers 
of the Constitution, might disrupt the Government as effectually as 
though accomplished by sword and gun, and the illustration might have 
been carried much further, which I will not take the time of the Senate 
in doing. The example, sir, of other governments — even if they corre- 
spond in essential points of resemblance to our own, and those examples 
which have been heretofore cited by the supporters of this measure do 
not so correspond — would afford no salutary precedent for our own pro- 
cedure. Why? Because the constitution and genius of our govern- 
mental fabric are so entirely different, as to furnish no precise points of 



246 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

correspondence from which to draw parallel illustrations. Being purely 
a Government of consentaneous powers in its legislative and execu- 
tive features, the moment the free agency of one of the elements is in- 
terfered with, that moment is violence done to the genius of the structure, 
and that moment is the ideal of republican government dissolved and 
hidden in the dark shadows of a government by force. The principle 
may live, sir, but the tangible essence will vanish. Now, sir, if the legit- 
imacy of the principle of compelling one or two branches of the Gov- 
ernment to yield to the other that free agency which constitutes one of 
the beauties and safeguards of the Republic, be firmly established, then 
it is but a simple question of time and incident as to the precise period 
when the Government will go to pieces like a ship upon the rocks, and 
the American may exclaim with the Roman General, " Actum est de 
republica" ("It is all over with the republic"). 

This destruction will not come of necessity from the action contem- 
plated in this bill ; it will not, this year, nor probably the next : but year 
by year encroachments will be made in this direction and in that direction ; 
first one safeguard will be overturned and then another ; to-day we shall 
have a statute repealed by indirect methods, and next year we may have 
the provisions of the Constitution itself subverted by the simple action 
of one branch of the National Government. 

After quoting- the section of the law as it stood : — 

No military or naval officer, or other person engaged in the civil, 
military, or naval service of the United States, shall order, bring, keep, 
or have under his authority or control, any troops or armed men at the 
place where any general or special election is held in any State, unless 
it be necessary to repel the armed enemies of the United States, or to 
keep the peace at the polls. 

— Senator Logan proceeded to draw attention to the eight 
last words thereof, which the Democrats proposed to repeal, 
and declared that the obvious purport and intention of the 
section was, as he said, "To restrict, to prohibit, and prevent 
every species of improper interference in elections by the 
civil, military, or naval powers of the General Government. 
In this respect the language of the section is as sweeping as 
the most active requirements could well demand. As a gene- 
ral mandate it is wholly conclusive. It is both declaratory 
and executive of the principle of absolute non-interference in 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 247 

elections. The most radical demand could ask for nothing 
more." 

General Logan then proceeded to prove in the most con- 
clusive manner, by authoritative statistics, not alone that there 
is " no such a thing as fair elections in the majority of the 
Southern States ;" that "the colored man has been cheated 
of his citizenship, robbed of his franchise, and the Republican 
Party, through its magnanimity to a people who have shown 
by their acts how little they deserve it, have been shorn of 
the power to continue peacefully their work of reconstruction 
upon the ideal hope of the Republic ;" but also that " this 
country is to-day governed by the South." After covering 
much other ground, pertinent to the question, in the most in- 
teresting manner, and showing that, throwing aside all other 
matters, " there is one radical issue between the parties, which 
involves the perpetuation or discontinuance of our present 
form of government, as the one or the other party may suc- 
ceed," — to wit, " the narrow and antiquated idea of State 
Sovereignty " represented by the Democratic Party, and the 
great National idea of the Republican Party, — Senator Logan 
continued : 

I solemnly warn my Democratic friends against the violent policy 
they are pursuing. They are sowing the wind ; let them beware .of 
the harvest! Let them not again mistake the temper of the loyal 
people of this country. Open, generous, magnanimous they have 
proved themselves, as the Southern Democracy have good cause to 
know and feel. But I stand here to-day to warn the men who, having 
once'attempted the destruction of the Government, are tampering with 
it again, that they must not go too far. Loyal men have not forgotten 
their brothers who found untimely graves at the hands of treason. They 
have not forgotten their own wounds, privations, and sufferings. They 
have not forgotten the price paid for the blessings of freedom they 
enjoy. They are slow to fhove, slow to believe that which they do not 
wish to believe. But if this Democratic Party of oppression and ag- 
grandizement again forces the issue on this country, and compels the 
people once more to rise in their might and rescue their free institu- 
tions from the torch which threatens their destruction, there will be no 



248 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

half-way work about it. The spirit of kindness heretofore actuating 
our people toward men who insist upon showing they. do not deserve it, 
is fast changing into another feeling. Sir, I tell these men, in the plain- 
est language, that they are going too far. They are tampering with the 
patience and forbearance of a people who are beginning to feel that 
patience and forbearance are fast ceasing to be virtues. Let Democrats 
of the South, and their Northern allies, beware the storm they are rais- 
ing. The spirit of retaliation once raised, sir, will only be appeased by 
the most radical assurances of future quiet. If the disease upon our 
body-politic again requires the knife, they may rest assured the surgeon 
will " cut beyond the wound to make the cure complete." 

And in concluding, he uttered these noble words : 

The Republican Party want peace ; they have shown it by every con- 
cession which honor and dignity would permit ; they will still sacrifice 
much to obtain a permanent peace ; but the Democracy may as well 
learn now, as later, that there are some things the Republicans will 
not do, to reach a peace which can but be dishonorable to them and to 
the country. They will not abjectly beg upon their knees for peace. 
They will not relinquish any of those advanced principles which have 
inured to the Government and the people through the sufferings of the 
war. They will never abandon the principles enunciated in the thirteenth, 
fourteenth, and fifteenth amendments to the Constitution. They will 
never permit a modification of the rights of the four million blacks of 
the South. They, after having been liberated from slavery and elevated 
to the full rights of citizenship, shall not be remanded to a condition as 
bad as, or worse than, serfdom or peonage. They will never, never 
quietly permit, sir, the elective franchise, upon the purity of which rests 
our whole political structure, to be dispensed at the hands of hired ruf- 
fians and paid assassins. 

Now, sir, let me invite the Democracy to a peace which shall be co- 
extensive with the whole limits of our country ; which shall be honor- 
able to them and honorable to us ; which shall be lasting as the Ameri- 
can name ; which shall elevate us in the estimation of all the nations, 
and stamp our Government as a model for all other peoples for a 
thousand centuries, — a peace which must be built upon genuine ties of 
respect between citizens of a common country ; which must rest upon 
the concession of equal rights to all citizens of the Republic, be they 
white or black, foreign or native born, — a peace which must know no State 
lines for abrogating the rights of citizens, but shall cluster us around 
the American flag as the emblem of a patriotic and virtuous people 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 249 

united under a government strong enough to defy the monarchs of the 
world and also to protect its citizens in all their constitutional rights, on 
land and on sea, at home and abroad, leaving the great future of our 
glorious country clean, clear, and full, in the blazing sunlight of our hope. 

The Washington National Republican, of April 17, 1879, 
referring to this great effort, said : 

We yesterday morning published a liberal synopsis of Senator 
Logan's speech, delivered in the Senate, on Tuesday, on the Army 
Appropriation Bill, but that abstract but feebly portrays the real power 
of the effort. It should be read entire, to give the mind a just concep- 
tion of its true merit as an arraignment of Democratic hypocrisy, both 
as to the effort now being made to remove existing safeguards from the 
ballot-box and the elective franchise, and as to the assertion of the 
doctrine of State sovereignty, or " home rule," as it is now termed by 
those who insist upon elevating the State above Federal power as it may 
suit those who believe in secession and a final subjugation of the Federal 
to State domination. 

Senator Logan has aimed, in this effort, to show the hollowness of 
the plea that there is any necessity now for the repeal of the law 
enacted for the protection of the elective franchise, as it is attempted in 
the bill under consideration, and he accomplished his work with signal 
success. He rebuked in a very proper and forcible manner the attempt 
made to pull a questionable provision through to the statute-book by 
attaching it to a measure of absolute necessity to the operation of the 
Government. He warned of the danger that must inevitably attend 
these departures from usage — these encroachments which, when toler- 
ated, will follow each other in rapid succession until the whole fabric of 
law and government will be subverted. The danger is in the precedent, 
which, once established, will lead into dark and dangerous paths in the 
history of the Republic, until it will be starved or violated one way or 
another, and will present only a wreck of its former self. He cited 
authorities of unquestioned Democratic orthodoxy to show that it has 
been part of the Democratic creed to recognize and justify the interpo- 
sition of the veto power to save the Government from the infliction of 
depraved laws. He showed also, beyond a doubt, that if any measure 
deserves the application of the veto it is that under discussion. He 
called attention, in eloquent and powerful phrase, to the necessities fur- 
nished in the history of our country, and of a modern date, why the 
existing law should remain undisturbed as a shield to the right and a 
safeguard against wrong. 



250 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



Senator Logan fortified his position against the doctrine of State 
sovereignty, with authorities and precedents, until he was strongly and 
invincibly intrenched. He established the fact by unquestionable au- 
thorities, that the doctrine of State sovereignty was not recognized by 
the Democratic Party when slavery and the Fugitive Slave Law had 
an existence. Then Democrats, Whigs, and Republicans bowed sub- 
missively to the doctrine that Federal power was supreme over all the 
States of the Union, for the return of the fugitive slave to bondage. 
The citation of these authorities and precedents brought to light the 
exceeding hollowness of the Democratic assertion of State sovereignty 
as supreme over the Federal power in all matters relating to Federal 
affairs. The danger of tolerating such a pernicious dogma in this 
Republic is made very apparent. 

Senator Logan opened up from the page of history, sustained by 
facts and figures, a full justification of the law the Democrats now 
propose to repeal. It came of necessities created by a Democratic 
disregard of right and honesty in the conduct of our elections, and 
hence the architects of that necessity now clamor for the overthrow of 
the law. The closing portion of his effort is marked with peculiar force 
as an arraignment of the Democratic Party, and as a warning against 
the consequences of its present line of policy. 

Touching the great debate in the Senate on the army bill, 
the Daily State Jo7irnal, April 19, 1879, said : 

The debate on the army bill in the Senate, during the present week, 
has been of exceptional interest. It will generally be conceded, how- 
ever, that the speeches which have, so far, attracted the largest atten- 
tion have been those of Senators Blaine and Logan, on Monday and 
Tuesday. 

Alluding to Blaine's great effort on the Monday, a corre- 
spondent of the Marseilles Register said: 

It is pronounced, by all, to be Mr. Blaine's greatest effort ; and Gen- 
eral Logan, who congratulated the speaker heartily on it, declares that 
it is the greatest speech he ever heard in the Senate Chamber. 

A Washington special to the Cincinnati Commercial said, 
of General Logan's speech on the Tuesday following : 

It was the stalwart speech of the session, pitched to about the key 
of that of Chandler some weeks ago. Chandler and Blaine were con- 
stantly present, giving close attention, and warmly congratulating the 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 25 1 

orator at the conclusion. The galleries were packed, and hundreds 
were unable to gain admission. The crowd seemed to be with Logan 
in sentiment, for there were several attempts at applause, which were 
suppressed. 

A Washington special to the Chicago Inter-Ocean said: 

Judge James of New York, who sat on the Bench of that State for 
twenty-four years before he came to Congress, says that Senator Logan's 
presentation of the points at issue on the army bill was the best that has 
yet been made. 

The Inter- Ocean itself said editorially of Senator Logan's 
speech on this occasion, — the full text of which it published : 

It is undoubtedly one of the ablest presentations of the Republican 
side yet made, and will be read with great satisfaction by the people of 
the Northwest. 

Another special to that paper said : 

General Logan made a powerful speech to-day on the army bill, 
occupying the floor over two hours. The galleries were crowded, and 
the area behind the Senators' desks was filled with members of the 
House and other distinguished visitors. It was a discussion of the legal 
points involved, and most of the speech was devoted to a studied 
analysis of the relation of the army to the civil power of the Govern- 
ment, and to the extent which the civil power could carry the army in 
enforcing its processes. He went into history, and related at length 
the precedents established by Democratic Presidents in using the army 
as a civil weapon, which the Democrats in Congress were now denying 
that they had a right to do. One of the strongest points Logan made 
was by showing Democratic inconsistency — by picturing their position 
on this question in slave times, and their position now. He had read 
President Fillmore's proclamation in 185 1, calling for the restoration of 
a fugitive slave, and then cited the celebrated Burns fugitive case, and 
asked where the doctrine of State rights had been in the days when 
slaves were pursued by the forces of the General Government into 
States where citizens wished to protect them from degrading bondage. 
The same black man, once hunted down, asked protection in the rights 
guaranteed him by law ; but State rights now were set up to take away 
his protection in the exercise of his privilege. This point is one of the 
strongest that has been made in the debate in either House, and is 
unanswerable. After discussing, at length, the legal questions involved, 



252 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



the relations of Congress and the Executive, the question of forcing 
legislation upon the President by making supplies for the Government 
dependent upon it, — the same questions that were argued over and over 
again in the House, — Logan came down to matters of fact, and, as 
Senator Chandler expressed it, "pitched into the rebels." The theme 
was a good one, and Logan was well fitted to handle it, for he and 
Burnside, Kellogg, and Plumb, are the only Union soldiers in the 
Senate. His remarks were right to the point ; and he showed how the 
ex-Confederates, having failed by arms to capture the Government, had 
succeeded in doing it by violence and fraud at the ballot-box. At the 
conclusion he was warmly congratulated. 

A Washington special in the Troy Daily Times said of it : 

General Logan made an eloquent and effective speech on the 
political situation in the Senate this afternoon — the best thus far that 
has been delivered on the pending bill. The galleries were crowded 
with attentive listeners. 

Editorially, the same paper said : 

The speech of General Logan in the Senate of the United States 
yesterday dealt with unvarnished facts, the free statement of which 
must have made the ex-Confederates and their Northern henchmen 
squirm. Beck, of Kentucky, squealed aloud in anguish and malice. 

The Era-Illinoisan of April 1 8th, said : 

Thank God, Illinois is again represented in the United States Senate 
by a stalwart. Logan spoke in thunder tones, Tuesday. 

Under the heading " General Logan at the front once 
more," the Chicago Evening Journal, April 16th said: 

From the time that it became evident that the Senate of the United 
States was drifting into Democratic control, the election of General 
Logan to represent the Republican Party of Blinois in that body 
became a foregone conclusion. It was felt that he was the right man 
to do battle for Republicanism in that supreme council of the Nation, 
and in speech, as by vote, meet the common enemy. His masterly effort 
of yesterday thoroughly justified that sentiment. It was a speech of 
which every Republican may well be proud. The subject is hackneyed. 
Garfield, Blaine, and a host of lesser lights had discussed it, but the 
fertile brain and high statesmanship of General Logan found in it 
ample scope. For two hours he held the Senate and the galleries, as 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 253 

he held up to view the diabolical purpose and revolutionary policy of 
the Confederate Democracy. 

Another journal said : 

The North will thank Senators representing that section for more 
just such speeches as General Logan's, for they tend to arouse the loyal 
public to a consciousness of the danger the country is in, under the 
control of the Confederate brigadiers. 

Said the Des Moines Register: 

General Logan met the rebel brigadiers, in the Senate, last Tues- 
day, and, as on the tented field in the days that tried American nerve, 
"waxed 'em." The gallant General well and nobly represents the 
Union army in its cause, and well and nobly represents its interest in 
Congress. It is a pity the North had not a dozen more Union Generals 
in the Senate to aid him. 

These are but samples, of hundreds of similar enco- 
miums, from the press of the country. 

ONE OF THE " CONFEDERATE BRIGADIERS" CHALLENGES GENERAL 

LOGAN LOGAN TREATS HIS COMMUNICATIONS WITH CONTEMPT, 

AND TELLS THE BRIGADIER'S " SECOND " TO " GO TO ." 

During April, 1879, General Logan performed an act of 
the highest moral courage, in declining to notice a challenge 
sent him by Representative W. M. Lowe of Alabama, one of 
the " Confederate brigadiers," all of whom felt dreadfully over 
the lashing Logan had given them in his great speech on the 
army bill. General Logan, as we have seen, had delivered 
the speech on April 15th. On the 16th, the special cor- 
respondent of the Pittsburg Post telegraphed that paper, 
as follows : 

The grandeur of Logan's loyalty is dimmed a little by the following 
conversation which occurred between your correspondent and Con- 
gressman Lowe of Alabama, a Greenback Representative from the 
Huntsville District : 

Correspondent. — " Are you sure, Colonel Lowe, that Senator Logan 
ever contemplated entering the Confederate service ?" 



254 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



Colonel Lowe. — " I am sure that there were three regiments of Illinois 
men in the Confederate service ; that I fought through the war with 
them ; that I knew and often conversed with many of them, and that, 
without exception, those with whom I talked on the subject assured me 
that their regiments were raised by Logan for the Confederate service. 
Why, it is so true that Logan himself will not deny it if asked it upon 
the floor of the Senate. He will dodge the question. True ? Why, I 
tell you I have talked with men whom I knew, and who declared that 
they were enlisted for the Confederate service by Logan." 

This was but a reassertion of an old campaign slander 
that had been refuted time and time again, but which was 
now reiterated by one of the Confederate brigadiers, pos- 
sibly in the hope of fastening a quarrel upon General Logan, 
of goading him into a duel, and of making some such 
example to brave Northern men as was made by Judge 
Terry of the lamented Senator Broderick. On April 21st, 
General Logan replied in the Washington National Repub- 
lican, after quoting the interview aforesaid, as follows : 

As to there being three regiments of Illinois men in the Confed- 
erate service, and that I raised them or any of them for the Confederate 
army, in defence of the honor of the State I in part represent, and of 
myself, I answer the statement is false. There were not three regi- 
ments in the Confederate service from Illinois, nor two, nor one ; and 
that I ever raised a regiment or company, or any part of a company, or 
had anything to do, either directly or indirectly, in raising men for such 
service, is maliciously and villainously false. And it is further stated 
in said despatch that this " statement [meaning that I raised men for 
the Confederate service] is so true that I would not deny the charge if 
made on the floor of the Senate," but that " I would dodge the ques- 
tion." Now, sir, I say "that I do not now nor have I ever dodged the 
question. The whole statement, so far as I am concerned, is a vindic- 
tive and malicious lie." 

Then follows a statement of how the falsehood was first 
fabricated, and why it was spread, and of its refutation. The 
General concluded his letter thus : 

I understand that Colonel Lowe claims that this is not a correct re- 
port of what he said to the reporter. If not, he should correct the state- 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 255 

ment, and make the reporter responsible for putting a lie in his mouth. 
The statement I brand as false and slanderous, and Colonel Lowe and the 
reporter can settle it between themselves as to which one has been 
guilty of perpetrating this villainous falsehood. John A. Logan. 

In a subsequent communication to the press, Colonel 
Lowe, after quoting - the preceding paragraph and italicizing 
the strongest expressions, as above, stated that, on April 
21st, he sent a note to General Logan which ended thus : 

This being the substance of my statement in said interview, I desire 
to know whether in your communication to the Republican this morning 
you apply the words " false and slanderous " to me. 

(Signed) Wm. M. Lowe. 

This will be handed to you by my friend, Charles Pelham, Esq. 
(Signed) W. M. L. 

Continuing his communication, Colonel Lowe said : 

This note was delivered by Judge Pelham to Senator Logan at his 
city residence on the morning of the 22d inst. Receiving no reply, I 
sent on the morning of the 24th inst. the following note. 

Here follows the note, which recited the fact of his having 
sent the letter of the 21st, and summarized its substance, and 
continued : 

Having received no reply to that letter, I am forced to again call 
your attention to these offensive words, and to demand to know whether 
you apply them to me. My friend Charles Pelham, Esq., is authorized 

to receive your reply. 

Very respectfully, , • 

(Signed) Wm. M. Lowe. 

"This note," continued Mr. Lowe, "was delivered to 

Senator Logan in the vestibule of the Senate Chamber on the 

afternoon of its date. Receiving no reply, I sent Senator 

Logan the following note, which was delivered to him at 3 p.m. 

on the day of its date : 

"'Washington, D. C, April 25, 1879. 
" ' Hon. John A. Logan. 

"'Sir : On the 21st inst. you published in the Republican of this city 
a communication containing words personally reflecting upon me. I 



256 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

have twice addressed you a note calling attention to this language. You 
have failed and refused to answer either of them, and you thereby force 
me to the last alternative. I therefore demand that you name some 
time and place out of this District where another communication will 
presently reach you. My friend Charles Pelham, Esq., is authorized to 

act in the premises. 

" ' Respectfully, 
(Signed) "'Wm. M. Lowe.'" 

In conclusion, of his own account of the affair, says Mr. 

Lowe : 

Thus ended this one-sided correspondence which explains itself. It 
needs little or no comment from me. I will not brand John A. Logan 
as a liar, for he is a Senator of the United States; I will not post him as 
a scoundrel and poltroon, for that would be a violation of the local stat- 
utes ; but I do publish him as one who knows how to insult but not how 
to satisfy a gentleman, and I invoke upon him the judgment of the 
honorable men of the community. Very respectfully, 

(Signed) Wm. M. Lowe. 

Of course the newspapers were all full of this sensational 
matter, for days after. Senator Logan's account of the Lowe 
performance is given thus, in one of the papers of the day : 

Logan, when asked to-night about the reported challenge, said that 
Lowe could make as great an idiot of himself as he pleased. He (Logan) 
should pay no attention to it. 

" Have you read the challenge ? " asked the correspondent. 

" No," was the reply ; " Lowe has been writing me letters for several 
days past, and when a messenger came this morning I declined any 
more communications on any subject." 

"So you don't know what the last missive was ?" 

"No," said the Senator. 

" It is said that it was a formal request for you to deny over your 
own signature the charge of lying made by you against Lowe, or else to 
name a place outside the District where a written communication could 
reach you." 

Logan burst into a hearty fit of laughter, and said contemptuously, 
" I shall pay no attention to this man ; but if he wants to test my cour- 
age he can easily find the way without this parade." 

The course of General Logan, throughout this whole af- 
fair, received the warmest commendation of the Northern and 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 257 

Western press, as showing the highest degree of good sense 
and true moral courage; and the following resolution was 
unanimously adopted May 2, 1879, by a joint caucus of the 
Republican members of the Illinois Senate and House : 

Resolved, That we, the Republican members of the General Assembly 
of the State of Illinois, in joint caucus assembled, heartily approve of 
the action of Senator Logan in his recent controversy with Representa- 
tive Lowe. That, having heretofore demonstrated his courage on many 
a hard-fought battle-field, it is not now necessary for him to resort to 
the false and demoralizing duello code of the South to vindicate either 
his honor or his courage, and we recognize in the present attitude of 
Senator Logan a moral courage far higher and more commendable than 
any he could display in accepting a challenge or meeting his antagonist 
on any falsely called field of honor. 

Apropos of this " duel " business, " Gath " happened 
to meet General W. T. Clark, ex-M.C, and formerly Adju- 
tant-General of the Army of the Tennessee, in New York, 
about this time, and from an interesting interview with him, 
of April 30th, in the Graphic, the following paragraphs are 
culled : 

" General, do you suppose the rebel troops in the Western army 
fought as well as in Virginia ? " 

" They were often the same troops. At Ezra Church, looking over 
a log as I lay down on my face, I saw the rebel column brought five 
successive times out of the woods where they had been formed, and 
compelled to charge, and every time they melted away. I don't say that 
the Eastern troops had not plenty of courage ; but it was natural that 
Western boys, brought up among horses, on farms, in sight of Indians, 
and used to firearms, should make quicker soldiers than the boys of the 
old still towns in the East. The East furnished the capital for that war, 
and the West was quicker with men." 

" Returning to the army, what is your estimation of Sherman ?" 
"He is a strategist, with a good deal of ability to lay out a large 
campaign." 

"What kind of a commander was John A. Logan ?" 
"When there was no fighting to be done he was one of the most in- 
J 7 



258 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

subordinate Generals I ever saw ; but in action his behavior had an in- 
fluence over his troops perfectly irresistible. He had black hair, broad 
shoulders, a look of resolution, and could swear tremendously. He would 
say, 'Boys, go at 'em now ; I have found where they are for you, just in 

that clump of trees ; come right along with me and we'll give 'em !' 

Although never wounded [This is a mistake. He had often been wounded, 
as we have seen in narrating his military life], he was almost invariably 
upon the battle-line. Frank Blair was also a brave man, but he never 
went to the front in action ; he kept the position prescribed by military 
rules. Logan's influence with his corps in battle was enormous." 

"What do you think about this noisy duel, so called, between Logan 
and one Lowe of Alabama?" 

"John A. Logan can take a revolver and shoot a 3-cent piece out of 
the fork of a bush with the nonchalance that you shake that cane. As 
to his courage, you can't make anybody discount that. He simply has 
no time to fool with such a fellow as Lowe." 

The Christian Advocate of May 1, 1879, said of the af- 
fair: 

Lowe says, Retract, fight, or be flogged ; but Logan does not obey 
orders with the slightest alacrity. He does not retract. He leaves 
Lowe and the reporter to wrangle about which one tells the lie. He 
does not fight. He does not even allow his stable-boy to run a foot- 
race with Lowe. He does not recognize Lowe's existence. He acts as 
if Lowe, having committed a mean, slanderous crime beneath the 
possibilities of any gentleman, cannot be treated as a gentleman till he 
acts like one. The old bully and bludgeon business of the South with 
the cry of coward is unavailing. General Logan bears too many hon- 
orable scars for even his enemies to hint at cowardice. No man that 
ever heard of "Champion Hills" could believe such a hint. It only 
remains for Lowe to flog the General when he meets him on the street. 
But that is not an undertaking for boys. Possibly half a dozen of 
these bullying bulldogs might venture to assail him. Even that is not 
safe. 



We arc glad General Logan remembers that he is a Christian states- 
man and not a heathen prize-fighter or gladiator. He represents a 
Christian civilization. He is intrusted with the honor of membership 
in the Methodist Episcopal Church, and he cannot stoop to be insulted 
by any bully. 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 2 59 

Said another journal : 

John A. Logan is a good Methodist and will not fight a duel, but he 
uses pretty strong language sometimes. When Mr. Lowe's " second " 
waited on Logan with a challenge, Logan refused to receive it, and 
said, " Go to hell with it ! I will not even recognize the existence of 
your principal until he makes an abject apology " — to which we, with 
all the good Methodist brethren, say Amen. 

Said the Washington Republica7i : 

Senator Logan continues to receive high and unqualified commenda- 
tion for sitting down hard on the idiotic, vulgar, brutal, and murder- 
ously digraceful code duello. It required a brave man to do this, and 
Logan's display of that courage comes with splendid effect in view of 
his grand record as a soldier and his wide reputation as a statesman. 

It was considered by the New York Tribune and other 
papers that " General Logan has done a public service by his 
action in the case of the bullying Alabama Congressman, 
William M. Lowe." 

Thus ended this episode. We shall see, later, how 
Logan forced Democratic Senators to acknowledge that 
these insinuations against Logan's loyalty before the war 
were false, and that the proofs were "full, complete, and 
concltisive" 

It may be mentioned en passant, however, that it would 
have been a bad day for Lowe had he ventured to make a 
physical attack upon General Logan, or had the latter chosen 
to go on the "field of honor," as the latter was somewhat of 
an athlete, having learned boxing even as a boy, and was a 
dead shot* 



* General Logan was always fond of out-door sport. He was an admirable horseman 
and swordsman, and knew how to handle a rifle, but he was the last man to brag of his 
strength or skill. When down at the Hot Springs of Arkansas, a few years ago, trying to 
throw off a peculiarly severe attack of rheumatism, he astonished the pistol experts of that 
pistolling country. On one occasion a dozen young men were shooting from the piazza of 
the General's hotel at a bottle laid on the broad crotch of a distant tree. The bottle was 
round. Unless it was hit plumply in the middle, it spun round and round like a top. The 
young men were good shots, but now and then they would miss the somewhat difficult mark. 
Then the invalid Senator would chaff them. The young men finally became irritated, 



2 6o LIFE OF LOGAN. 

GENERAL LOGAN'S DOMESTIC LIFE AT WASHINGTON HIS WIFE 

AND CHILDREN A HAPPY HOME. 

Washington correspondence of the Philadelphia Record, 
February 28, 1879, says of the General's domestic life at this 
time: 

Mrs. Logan is almost the model of an American woman. She is not 
at all such a woman as one would naturally suppose from reading of 
the powerful factor she has been in her husband's successes. There is 
nothing of the strong-minded woman about her, in the ordinary accep- 
tation of that term. She is the embodiment of dignity, and one of the 
most quiet, womanly, wifely women imaginable. Not pretty, but fine- 
iooking ; tall and shapely, with a perfectly moulded head ; dark-brown 
hair,* with just a few silver threads ; clear, quiet eyes, a high, intel- 
lectual brow, and a mouth that expresses more than all the rest of the 
face together — a mouth that can be tremulous with love, or firm with 
duty, as occasion may require. Her voice is soft and low, as a woman's 
should be, her manner gracious and dignified, and her movements 
quiet and lady-like. Her admiration of and devotion to her husband 
borders on the sublime. To her he is evidently the one great man in 
all the earth. Every thought is for him and their children. Every look 
and gesture ennobles him. They have two children — a daughter, just 
on the verge of womanhood, who was married a year or two ago, and a 
son in his early teens. Both children are unusually bright, intelligent, 
and fine-looking. The daughter has been her mother's helpmeet in 
matters political and social for years, and the boy is as thorough-going 
a specimen of that genus as could be found in a day's march. He 
already shows the audacity and daring of his father, combined with the 

and asked Logan if he could improve upon their skill. After a little more chaffing he said : 
"I'll tell you fellows what I will do. There are twelve of you, but I'll give you each a 
box of cigars for every time you hit the bottle if you'll give me a box every time I hit it." 

The boys accepted the proposition instantly. 

"I'll shoot first," said Logan; "and if I hit I'm to shoot again and again until I 
miss." 

They had no objection, so the General fired twelve consecutive shots, each time break- 
ing a different bottle, while the young men's eyes opened wider and wider. 

"Do you want any more? " he asked, after the twelfth shot. 

"No," said the young men, hastily; "we guess not." — Howard in the New York 
World. 

* Now all silvery white, a mute evidence of what she also suffered during, and since, the 
War of the Rebellion. 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 2 6i 

tenderer and more refined graces of his mother. When at home, in 
Chicago, they live in good style in a fine mansion. Here they have 
customarily lived comfortably in a genteel boarding-house, the General 
and his wife occupying a suit of parlors and the children separate 
rooms, and ... it must be said to his credit that no man in public life 
is happier in his family relations, or more often to be found inside the 
charmed border of his family circle. 

GENERAL SCHENCK ATTACKED IN THE SENATE SENATOR LOGAN 

PROMPTLY DEFENDS THE OLD PATRIOT-SOLDIER. 

Always ready to help the private soldier of the war, Gen- 
eral Logan was as ready to defend the patriot-officer when 
attacked by the Democrats. This he had shown many times, 
notably in his defence of his old commander General Grant, 
and of General Sheridan. Again, when, on May 17, 1879, 
Senator Saulsbury made an attack on General Schenck, 
- — then confined to his bed by an attack of Bright's Disease, 
from which he afterward most marvellously recovered, despite 
the apprehensions and ominous predictions of medical science 
— Senator Logan obtained the floor and said : 

Mr. President, I shall not detain the Senate very long ; but I cannot 
withhold a word in response to the remarks that fell from the lips of 
the Senator from Delaware. It has become fashionable to make thrusts 
right and left at persons in this country who did that which they con- 
sidered to be their duty in maintaining the supremacy of this great 
government of ours. Officers and soldiers of the army have frequently 
been sneered at in this Chamber. It has been thrust in our faces that 
the Republicans have given to those who served in the army a repre- 
sentation of but four in number in this chamber; and the boast has 
been made that the opposition have given so many more to certain 
soldiers because they fought for a different cause. 

I desire, in response to the Senator from Delaware, who said that 
General Schenck, "who had been placed where he should be on 
account of his nefarious conduct " — that was the precise language used 
by the Senator, as I understood him — 

Mr. Saulsbury — The Senator from Illinois will allow me to say that 
the remarks I made about General Schenck, I made before I knew the 
man was on a bed of sickness. 



262 LIFE OF IOGAN. 

Mr. Logan — I understand that. The Senator made them before he 
knew that the general was sick. That means if he had known that he 
was sick he would not have made them, but if he were well the Senator 
would still say what he did say. Now I desire on behalf of General 
Schenck to say, that no more honorable man lives. When treason 
stalked abroad in this land ; when this mighty nation of ours was reel- 
ing and rocking to and fro like a distressed vessel upon the stormy seas, 
he came forward and, with that strong arm of his, reached out that he 
might assist in steadying her as she rode on the billows of treason. He 
was one of the band of patriots in this land who defied treason, and 
faced the war made against the nation, willing to risk his life, and his 
all, for its preservation. I do not claim that he is entitled to great 
credit for being a patriot. It was naught but that which was his duty. 
But the fact that he was a patriot is no reason why he should be 
maligned, either here or elsewhere. What has he done, that he, for his 
" nefarious conduct," should receive the condemnation of the people of 
this country ? What " nefarious conduct " has he been guilty of ? He 
clutched the flag of his country in his hands, when treason seized it in 
order that it might be trampled in the dust. Was that "nefarious con- 
duct ?" Sir, is it for that he is to be condemned ? 

Sir, I am free to say that the insinuations and jeers that have been 
made in this Chamber, from the other side, toward men who fought for 
the Union, have not come frequently from men who shed their own 
blood or were willing to do it, but from men who did not and were not 
willing to do it. 

It is no mark of bravery that men sneer at others because they stood 
by their country. It is not the mark of gentility. It is no evidence of 
statesmanship. It is far from being proof of good breeding. 

Now, sir, General Schenck is getting old ; is with disease tottering on 
the road to the grave ; he is to-day crippled, maimed, disabled. A pen- 
sioner on his government on account of wounds that he received in its 
defence, he stands to-day before this land as a patriot, as an honest man, 
as a brave man, and, at all times, the peer of the Senator from Delaware. 
For that old patriot I have but this to say : The heart of the man that 
can allow him to touch the untarnished reputation of a brave man and 
a patriot, would go out against those much more near and dear to him 
than the one he seeks to strike. This man, General Schenck, is a true 
man and a patriot. For him I pray that peace may be all along his 
pathway, until the time shall come when he shall be summoned to 

"The undiscovered country from whose bourne 
No traveller returns." 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 263 

logan's speech on the united states marshals' appropria- 
tion BILL THE DEMOCRATIC ATTEMPT AT " NULLIFICATION 

AND ANARCHY." 

It will be remembered that in the great revolutionary con- 
flict between the Democratic Congress and the Republican 
Executive, to which allusion has already been made, the 
Democratic Houses insisted on putting obnoxious riders upon 
various appropriation bills with the avowed object of forcing 
them into the statute-book under the threat of " starving the 
government " if they did not receive executive approval. We 
have seen that on the Army Appropriation Bill, Senator 
Logan made a remarkable speech. But now the appropria- 
tion bill for the payment of United States marshals and super- 
visors of elections was before the Senate. The United States 
statutes already (see sections 2021, 2022, 2023, and 2024, 
Revised Statutes) had upon their pages certain sections pre- 
scribing the duties of marshals and deputies at elections to 
keep the peace, preserve order, and protect and aid the super- 
visors of elections in preserving the purity of the ballot-box 
and preventing election frauds at elections for representatives 
or delegates in Congress, which prescribed also penalties for 
non-compliance with such duties. But the Democrats owed 
their majority in the House to election frauds and violence at 
the polls in the Southern States, and hence it was to their 
interest to insure, if they could, immunity to such acts of fraud 
and violence. They therefore struck at the United States 
marshals, by insisting upon the insertion in this appropriation 
bill of the following clause, supposing that if the marshals 
were not paid they would not serve, and then such fraud and 
violence would have full swing : 

And no part of the money hereby appropriated is appropriated to 
pay any compensation, fees, or expenses under any of the provisions of 
title 26 of the Revised Statutes of the United States authorizing the 
appointment, employment, or payment of general or special deputy- 



264 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



marshals for services in connection with registration or elections on 
election-day. 

There was also a further restriction, as follows : 

And no department or officer of the Government shall, during said 
fiscal year, make any contract or incur any liability for the future pay- 
ment of money under any of the provisions of title 26, mentioned in 
section 1 of this act, until an appropriation sufficient to meet such con- 
tract or pay such liability shall have first been made by law, etc. 

This was followed by a penalty clause providing a heavy 
fine, or five years' imprisonment, or both, in case the law was 
infracted. 

Thus the Democrats hoped to strike in two ways at the 
marshals. First, if the marshals did their duty in accordance 
with the then existing law, they would not be paid for their 
services ; and second, if they complied with such law they 
would be fined or imprisoned, or both, for such compliance ! 

Senator Logan made an able speech in the Senate, June 
28, 1879, on this bill also. In concluding it he had the said 
sections from the Revised Statutes read, and continued as 
follows : 

I have had these sections read for the purpose of showing that it was 
the duty of the court to be open for the purpose, if arrests are made, of 
giving trial or examination. Not only that, but for the purpose of 
showing exactly the duties of the marshals or the deputy-marshals who 
are appointed under these provisions ; that their duty is not to interfere 
with elections, it is not to interfere with the quiet and good order of 
the people ; that their duties are not to see that persons vote, or that 
persons do not vote ; but that it is their duty, in an orderly and proper 
manner, to execute — what ? The orders which they are required to 
execute in reference to keeping the peace and protecting citizens in the 
right they are attempting to exercise at the polls. 

I do not wish to discuss the question as to the propriety of keeping 
the peace at the polls, or the good order of society. That has been 
discussed over and over again in this Chamber ; but it does seem to 
me that any member of Congress, or any constituency, that will nul- 
lify a law that provides for keeping the peace with peace-officers, for 
protecting citizens on the day of an election or on any other day, pre- 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 



265 



venting murder, bloodshed, and crimes of various kinds from being 
committed, must act upon a theory strange and novel indeed. But if 
the peace cannot be kept in any other way, and a marshal shall under- 
take to exercise his authority on that day to make arrests, either from 
view or under a warrant that may be given him directed against an 
individual — if he does it under any one of these sections of the statutes, 
he is liable, under the proposed measure, to confinement in the peniten- 
tiary and to pay a heavy fine. 

You may search the laws, I believe, of every nation, and you cannot 
find on their statute-books, anywhere, a provision in which a man is 
punishable by imprisonment and by fine, as an officer, for keeping the 
peace by authority, or for executing the law. You can find no such 
instance in the history of all the enactments of any government. It at 
least has been understood by us, heretofore, that it was the duty of 
peace-officers to see that the peace was preserved. It is their duty to 
see that the laws are obeyed and are faithfully executed. It is their 
duty to protect citizens and to make arrests where violence is used or 
where violations of the law are wantonly perpetrated. And yet we are 
told distinctly in this bill to-day that wherever peace is broken on elec- 
tion-day you shall not restore it ; that is to say, if the peace is kept, there 
is no necessity then for an attempt to keep it ; but if the peace is not 
kept, then you shall make no more effort to keep it than if it were per- 
fectly preserved; that is, the United States shall not do it. In other 
words, if a murder is about to be committed, it is all well enough to stop 
it ; but if the life is to be preserved by an officer of the United States, it will be 
better to let the murder be committed. No marshal, no deputy-marshal, 
under any of these sections in title 26, shall enforce the law or protect 
the citizen against violence or in the exercise of a plain and constitu- 
tional duty. This, sir, is strange legislation indeed. It is even strange 
legislation for Democrats. It would be exceedingly strange legislation 
for Republicans. Why, sir, it would be strange legislation for the Fiji 
Islanders! We boast of our civilization ; we boast of our country, of 
our institutions, of the freedom of thought, the freedom of speech, the 
free exercise of the rights of the citizen in this glorious land of ours. 
We say it is the freest land on earth, and we glory in the name of free 
America. Yet to-day you propose to place upon the statute-books of the 
United States a declaration that the Government shall not enforce the 
law by one of its marshals for the purpose of protecting its citizens 
and keeping the peace. I did not know that we were running at rail- 
road speed into nullification and anarchy, and against the peace and 
good order of society. Why, sir, soon we will be in the very midst of 
confusion and disobedience to law, in the very midst of violence and 



266 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

tumult, the abridgment of rights, and the destruction of great and 
fundamental principles. The nullification and disobedience of law, 
is one of the first steps in the direction of disintegration and dissolu- 
tion. 

Such legislation is calculated to bring our country and our laws 
into disrepute, and make us a laughing-stock in the eyes of the civilized 
nations of the earth. 

I do not know whether this bill is to become a law or not. If so, I 
can only characterize it as surpassing all attempts that have yet been 
made by any Congress since this Government was formed, to show an 
utter determination to defy the laws — to nullify them by legislation. 
In other words, it is a rebellious spirit and act against the enforcement 
of the laws. That is the least you can make out of it. 

I tell Senators that this legislation will come home to plague the 
inventors very soon. You may imagine that in your wisdom in these 
halls, where statesmanship ought to dwell, you have managed and 
manipulated so that the country will sustain you in that which you 
have done ; but I tell you, when the people understand that you have 
torn down every guarantee to the protection of their rights at the 
ballot-box ; that you have disarmed the President of the United States, 
and destroyed a portion of his power ; that you have refused appro- 
priations to exercise that authority for the purpose of protecting the 
peace of the people at the polls ; and then, by a second law, you have 
demanded that no civil officer shall enforce the laws under the mandates 
of the courts or under the orders of the Executive of the United States 
for the purpose of keeping the peace in this country — when they under- 
stand that, you will find, even among the hot-bloods in this country, 
even among the people who think they ought to be exasperated on 
account of some imaginary offense perpetrated against them, even 
among the people who may think they are maltreated and much abused 
in every respect, and that their rights are trampled under foot, — even 
among this class of unthinking people, in their sober moments, they 
will never agree to any such proposition as this ; but they will say to 
you, "The theory of our Government is that the Constitution shall be 
obeyed ; that the laws made in pursuance thereof shall be executed ; 
that if the laws are bad laws they shall be repealed ; but, until they 
are repealed, no party has a right to nullify them and deny their en- 
forcement." 

Sir, the idea that American citizens shall deny any authority for 
the enforcement of the laws, is a theory never taught by the statesmen 
of this land, before. It has never been taught by your Clays, your 
Websters, and your leading men. Revolution may have been taught, 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 



267 



but there is a difference between revolution, and nullifying a law. 
Where people may believe that oppression is bearing them down, and 
they undertake to throw off the yoke or throw off the laws by revolu- 
tion, it is very different from denying the power of the Government to 
enforce the laws that they themselves enact, and are required to observe. 
The very laws that you yourselves have taken an oath to support, the 
very laws that you are bound to aid the Executive in enforcing, are the 
very laws that you tell the citizen shall not be obeyed. 

If the law in reference to protecting the citizens by a marshal on 
the day of an election shall not be enforced, although it remains upon 
the statute-book, I want you to tell me why the law against murder 
shall be enforced, and why a citizen should be subject to the law ? 
Why shall the law against larceny be enforced ? Why shall the law 
against arson be enforced ? Why shall the law against robbing the 
Treasury be enforced ? Why shall the law against defrauding the 
revenues be enforced ? Why shall the law against perjury be enforced ? 
Why shall the law against any of the offences known in the catalogue 
of crime be enforced ? You have as much right to deny the enforce- 
ment of the law against any crime, as you have to deny the enforcement 
of the laws for the preservation of the peace at the polls. The man 
who teaches the doctrine, to-day, that the citizen shall not obey the law, 
but it shall be nullified by withholding appropriations and by making 
it a penal offence to execute the law, teaches a doctrine that finally will 
become revolutionary, and will produce the same treasonable course 
that we have heretofore witnessed, for it leads to that. It leads to 
refusing to obey any law unless you yourselves have written it, unless 
you yourselves have enacted it. It leads to disobedience of the power 
and supremacy of the Government ; and finally it will find its results 
in disobedience to all laws, and the citizens, taught to take the power 
in their own hands, will execute that which serves their purpose, and 
disobey that which does not serve their purpose. In that way we are 
taught the lessons of Mexico, we are taught the lessons of the South 
American republics — the lesson of revolution, riot, and bloodshed, 
against the peace and stability of our country. 

Mr. President, in my judgment there will be a still small voice that 
will come up from the midst of the people of this country, ere long, that 
will be a warning to some of our friends in the future. The whisperings 
of that voice will be, that the teaching of the good men, the honest men, 
and patriots, has been, and is, obedience to the laws and the Constitu- 
tion of their country. Men who teach otherwise than this, are bad 
teachers for a community, are false teachers for a rising generation, and 
are sowing the seeds of destruction in their own government. 



268 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

ON THE STUMP AGAIN — THE GREAT DEMAND FOR LOGAN — 
CHARACTERISTIC INCIDENTS TOUCHING THE OLD SOLDIERS. 

At the close of this exciting- session, which had been full 
of arduous labors for him, General Logan returned to his 
home, at Chicago, to rest and to prepare for entering actively 
into the fall campaign in Ohio and Iowa. The great demand 
for General Logan's services on the stump is shown in the 
following, from the Freeport Journal of July 16, 1879: 

Speaking of the Ohio campaign, the Cincinnati Conunercial says of 
our Senator, Logan : 

"There is astonishing information from Columbus about the appli- 
cation made for speakers. John A. Logan is wanted in the most places. 
He will be a promising candidate for the Presidency presently. Next 
to Logan comes Garfield, and next to Garfield, Blaine. We are sur- 
prised to hear that old Zach Chandler does not come first." 

When President Hayes ran for Governor of Ohio the last time, Gen- 
eral Logan stumped the State at his urgent request, and Mr. Hayes as- 
sured him, after election, that his speeches had elected him. John A. 
has always been a power wherever we have put him, and should he be 
named for the Presidency would get as many votes as any one that could 
be nominated, would be elected by a rousing majority, and would fill 
the office as he has all the other high and responsible offices he has 
been called to fill, acceptably and well. No mistake would be made in 
heading our national ticket at the next election with the name of John 
A. Logan. 

It was about this time that the Chicago Evening Journal 
published the special despatch which is given below to show 
that General Logan's sympathy for the worn-out and helpless 
soldier was manifested in deeds, as well as words : 

Galesburg, III., July 12th. — Colonel L. Potter, late of the 33d Infan- 
try, who has been in ill-health for years, died this morning. Post No. 45, 
G. A. R., has provided for him and family since the organization of the 
Post. Colonel Potter was a gallant soldier, while in the service receiv- 
ing wounds which have made him helpless. He never applied for a 
pension until a few weeks ago, when the Post sent to General Logan, 
who secured a pension, in advance of thousands of applicants, of $32 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 269 

per month, and $3,500 back pension. This act of General Logan's will 
never be forgotten by the afflicted family of the deceased, nor by the 
entire community. 

At the soldiers' reunion at Aurora, in August of this same 
year, General Logan was a participant. The Tribune of 
August 23d, after referring to the fact that the General par- 
took of a little lunch in one of the headquarter tents, in com- 
pany with others, said : 

His seat was near the entrance, and it was amusing to see the war- 
worn veterans coming to him with an apology for intruding, but express- 
ing a strong desire to shake him by the hand. Old soldiers hobbled up 
on wooden legs, with one coat-sleeve empty, and under various similar 
circumstances, and, proudly pointing to their infirmities, would say, " I 
got that fighting in your division, General," or would name the battle 
that crippled them for life. And General Logan would shake them 
heartily by the hand and appear glad to see them. This reunion of 
soldiers has called up many reminiscences of the great struggle extend- 
ing over the period of nearly five years, and the old soldiers have spun 
many yarns since they have been here, and the remembrance of Camp 
Dick Yates will linger lovingly in their hearts for years to come. It is a 
question whether it will not have a better effect in rekindling the loy- 
alty of the people in this section of the country than all the essays, ser- 
mons, and political speeches which have been delivered in the past five 
years. 

The soldiers appear to be fonder of relating the scrapes and awk- 
ward positions they got into during their terms of service, than any of 
the more pleasant and less exciting episodes. Captain Collins, an old 
resident of Aurora, was introduced to General Logan to-day. He was 
the commander of a company in the Fourth Illinois Cavalry, and he 
tried to make General Logan remember him, without success for a time. 
Finally a gleam of joy overshadowed his face as he renewed the attack. 

''General," said he, "do you remember the circumstance of a cav- 
alry captain brought before you, at one time, on the charge of stealing 
horses ? I told you that cavalrymen were poor walkers, and their 

own horses were played out; and you said, 'By captain, I don't 

blame you a bit ! ' and dismissed me with a compliment, while you sent 
the owners of the horses back to my quarters to get whatever horses the 
company could not use and had to spare." 

The General then remembered the captain well, and shook him by 
the hand more warmly than ever. 



270 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

logan's canvass of ohio in 1879 — at dayton, Springfield, 

van wert, bellefontaine, and elsewhere ovations 

everywhere. 

General Logan's canvass of Ohio was a triumphant one. 
"No man," said the Inter- Ocean, "has been received with 
more favor by the people of Ohio than General John A. 
Logan. He meets with ovations everywhere he goes. No 
one has been more persistently vilified and lied about, and 
such receptions from the loyal masses in Ohio cannot be other 
than gratifying to him, as they are to his hosts of friends in 
Illinois." At Dayton he was met at the depot by a large 
committee of veterans, and great numbers of other veterans 
called on him. " No celebrated personage ever visited us," 
said a Dayton special of September 4th to the Cincinnati 
Gazette, " who attracted more attention or who was more 
cordially received than General Logan ; and we have had a 
look at all our eminent personages. ' You see,' remarked 
an old battle-scarred veteran, ' the General takes right hold 
of a fellow, and sorter shakes him up ! ' All the old army 
boys have faith in General Logan, and we heard quite a num- 
ber swear by him." The same account continues : 

The gathering of the masses at the court-house was a sight worth 
witnessing, and was an inspiration to the illustrious speaker. It was 
altogether the largest meeting of the sovereign people we have seen 
here since the papers have taken to publishing, the morning after their 
delivery, the speeches of illustrious men. It was an outpouring of 
the masses, and the enthusiasm of the crowd was quite up to the meas- 
ure of the great occasion. The appearance of the speaker on the stand 
was the signal for an outburst of applause such as is seldom heard ; it 
was such a greeting as any man might be proud of. 

In the course of his speech there, as reported by the 
above paper, General Logan said : 

" The Constitution makes every man born in the United States, or 
naturalized, a citizen of the United States, as well as of the State in 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 27 1 

which he lives, and holds him under obligation to support and defend 
the Government. It was folly to say that under the Constitution the 
Government could make laws, but had not the requisite powers to 
enforce them. All the power exists in the people of which the Nation 
is composed. So, when the Constitution guarantees to each State a 
Republican form of government, and to protect it against domestic vio- 
lence or invasion, it has the right, and it is its duty, to use the whole 
power of the people for this purpose. But they say the Government 
cannot invade a State. Nobody wants it to. We want it to enforce its 
own laws in each and every State. When Congress passed laws for pro- 
tection at the ballot-box, they carried with them the obligation to see 
them enforced. If it were otherwise ; if the State could nullify such 
laws, the State would be more powerful than the General Government. 
That was the doctrine attempted to be carried out in 1861 ; that is, the 
minority declared the majority had no power to decide the constitution- 
ality of questions affecting their interests ; that there was no power in- 
herent in the government for its own preservation. Upon that doctrine 
the Democratic Party brought on the war. All knew the results. It 
was hoped that the question was settled forever, but in the last Con- 
gress, State rights and secession reared its head again, declaring this was 
a mere confederacy ; that senators were only ambassadors from the 
States ; that there was no power to make the people of a State acknowl- 
edge the constitutionality of a law, or yield obedience to it. 

As to article 4, section 4, of the Constitution, providing that the 
State Legislatures may call on the Government for aid to suppress 
domestic violence, etc., it simply means that when a State has not the 
power to put down violence against its own laws and its own officers, it 
may ask the General Government for aid ; but when and wherever the 
Government finds it necessary to use force to execute its own laws and 
protect its own officers, the State has no part in the matter. The Gov- 
ernment executes its own laws, and every man in the Nation may be 
called out for the purpose of enforcing them, without waiting to be 
called on by the State authorities. In support of the Confederate 
idea, your Democratic Senators and members of Congress voted with 
the South. Why ? Because in the caucus, a majority were from the 
South, and when the decree of the caucus was known, every Northern 
Democrat ran eagerly to vote accordingly. They are bound hand and 
foot to obey the mandates of the South. Your members of Congress 
from this State have no more power with them than a child. 

At Springfield, the next night, there was another grand 
turnout of the people, and " General Logan held the audi- 



272 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



ence in the closest attention for two hours and a quarter." 
At the conclusion of Logan's speech, the following scene 
occurred. General Kennedy, after denying a published false- 
hood, that he had said that " he didn't believe there was an 
honest man in the Democratic Party," continued thus — as 
reported by the Springfield Republic : 

He told of some Democrats whom he liked and honored ; especially 
of one who, when it became a question of patriotism or party, gave up 
his party as a Democrat, and went to the front as a soldier to fight the 
battles of his country at the head of a large army. General Kennedy 
described that man as he saw him riding up and down the lines, cheer- 
ing his men on to victory, and concluded, "that man was General John 
A. Logan, who sits before you." At those words the vast audience 
rose to its feet and cheered itself hoarse, taking up the applause again 
and again. Such an ovation was probably never given any man in 
Springfield, and the best of it was, it was as honest and well meant as 
it was spontaneous. 

The Cincinnati Commercial correspondence of this date, 
from Columbus, gives the following exaggerated description 
of General Logan on the stump, which, however, is not so 
bad — barring the " long hair," which the General had not 
got — when it is known to have been written by a hostile pen : 

. . . He makes a good point, and there is an appreciative burst of 
applause from the audience, and the barriers are down at last, and 
Logan is charging them all along the line, as, in leaden hail, with flying 
banners and rattling musketry and screaming shells, he used to ride 
down on the rebel lines like the black angel of death. His sleeves are 
pulled up to his elbows, his long black hair is hanging over his flash- 
ing eyes ; his clenched right fist beats a tattoo on the desk beside him, 
or wildly pounds the open palm of his left hand with blows that would 
knock down an ox, and under the huge mustache the broad chin churns 
incessantly. Now and then he steps back and pauses, while he hitches 
up his sleeves, pushes back his long hair from his face, and tucks it 
under at the back of his neck, pulls his mustaches apart with both 
hands, and lunges forward like a diver, to get his coat back in shape. 
Then he puts the left thumb into the arm-hole, pushing back his coat- 
collar to do it, settles himself on his right leg with a stamp of the left 
foot, raises the rather stumpy index-finger of his right hand and inaug- 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 2 J* 

urates another advance, terminating inevitably in a wild charge and a 
ringing whoop-la and hi-yah of victory. His very earnestness and self- 
belief carry away his hearers. Whatever may be the feeling of the 
audience, it is plain to see that the speaker enjoys it. In Springfield 
he spoke for two hours and fifteen minutes, and closed then reluct- 
antly, and it is but fair to say that no speaker in the world ever ad- 
dressed a more appreciative audience, or one that listened more atten- 
tively to every word, and applauded more promptly and heartily every 
point made. Even the General said that he would speak in Ohio for a 
month if he could have such audiences as that, for it was one of the 
best he ever addressed. 

As it was at Springfield, so had it been at Van Wert, and 
so was it at Bellefontaine, and wherever in Ohio he addressed 
the people. Everywhere the audiences were immense, and 
the enthusiasm evoked by his coming, and by his speeches, 
unbounded. Indeed, the papers were full of suggestions of 
his name for the Presidency so great was his evident popu- 
larity wherever he went. 

HIS CAMPAIGN IN IOWA — OVATION AFTER OVATION ALONG THE 
WHOLE LINE FROM WATERLOO TO BURLINGTON LOGAN EX- 
CELS IN A NEW ROLE. 

In Iowa, later on, it was the same. At Waterloo he had 
to speak twice in one day. The Iowa State Registers account 
says : " The meeting in the beautiful West Side Park, in the 
afternoon, was the grandest political demonstration ever 
known in the Cedar Valley. The incoming trains were 
jammed to their utmost capacity, and when the great crowd 
of ten thousand people gathered about the speaker's stand in 
the afternoon, it was evident no human voice could bring 
them all within hearing. In the evening, at Waterloo, there 
was another magnificent meeting at the Opera House." At 
West Liberty, where the General's sleeping-car was side- 
tracked, the whole town, with a military company and band, 
turned out in the morning and insisted on a speech from 
Logan. Says the same account : " At every station along 



18 



274 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



the road, old soldiers would board the train and demand the 
privilege of shaking- hands with the General. At Newton, 
the General was received with a cannon salute, music by- 
bands, an address of welcome by Mayor Smith, and three 
times three cheers for Logan, by the veteran soldiers. Chair- 
man Runnells, and the reception committee from Des Moines, 
joined the party here. The General was taken at once to the 
court-house square, and addressed an immense audience for 
over two hours." Another account tells of the grand pro- 
cession ; the great display of red, white, and blue, from the 
houses on the line of march ; the magnificent triple arch of 
welcome formed of evergreens, stars, wreaths, pennons and 
flags bearing the names of Logan's battles, while the keystone 
of the arch was a hu^e cartridge-box inscribed with " Fifteenth 
Army Corps — Forty Rounds ;" the richly decorated stand in 
the court-house park ; the park covered with seats ; " the 
court-house itself one grand display of flags and color ;" and 
further describes the march itself as an " ovation." At Des 
Moines, September 15th, " General Logan," said a special to 
the Inter-Ocean, " drew such a crowd, that the Opera House, 
where he spoke, with a capacity of two thousand, would not 
hold one-third of those who wanted to hear him. He spoke 
for two hours — a powerful and effective effort. . . . There 
were many evidences that, as a soldier and a patriot, General 
Logan has a remarkable and lasting hold upon the affections 
and the admiration of the people of the State, regardless of 
political feeling or partisan bias." So it was everywhere. At 
Burlington the last of these grand ovations was given on 
September 18th. To add to the General's pleasure, Frank 
Hatton had telegraphed to Mrs. Logan to come on, and sur- 
prise the General. " She was made a member of the recep- 
tion committee, and," said an eye-witness, " when the General 
stepped off the train to the music of a cannon salute and a 
brass band, he received the best of all welcomes from his 
wife." The same narrator tells an interesting story of an im- 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 



275 



promptu chowder excursion given to the General and his 
wife, up the river, from Burlington to Otter Island. Said he : 
" Quite the most remarkable feature of the occasion occurred 
on the boat coming down. Night was falling, and the steamer 
was running rapidly down the Mississippi. The excursion- 
ists were all on deck, and General Logan at last yielded to 
the demands of the ladies for some recitations from Shake- 
speare. He stood in the centre of the company, and recited, 
in splendid style, some of the speeches of Richard the Third. 
In form, bearing, and appearance he seemed the very person- 
ation of tragic power and passion. It was a treat not soon to 
be forgotten, to hear a United States Senator and Major-Gen- 
eral recite Shakespeare in a manner Booth might envy." 

Under the head of "Logan's Logic — It did Good Work 
among the Democrats," the Hawkeye, September 20, 1879, 
said : 

General Logan has done a good work in Burlington. He had a 
great many Democrats among his auditors at Union Hall, who listened 
attentively to his eloquent address. They did not indorse all his ideas, 
but many of them acknowledged that he laid down a good many truths 
and political facts that are worth considering. " I tell you," said a 
prominent Democrat, "there is a good deal of sound sense in what 
Logan said about finances and about things down South. I can't and 
won't approve of such transactions as those down in Mississippi. It is 
all wrong, and there is no use trying to defend them. And Logan 
is right about the finances. His experience with the old State money is 
almost identical with mine. When I was a young man I worked on a 
farm near Burlington for $12.50 a month. Finally, when I was paid off, 
I came to town and took my money to the State Bank. Mr. Brooks 
paid me forty cents on the dollar for my money, and that was all it was 
worth. That made my wages $5 a month, instead of $12.50. I tell you 
I don't want any more of that kind of money. I've had enough of it. 
We have now the best monetary system in the world. Let it alone." 
And in all these utterances we are sure the gentleman reflected the sen- 
timents of hosts of the Democrats of Burlington. 

Among the numberless notices of General Logan's efforts 
in this campaign, the following will give a slight idea of the 



276 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

sensation he created both in Ohio and Iowa. Said the Mon- 
itor-Index, September 19th: 

General Logan is waking up the Republicans in Iowa. He is pre- 
senting some strong Republican arguments, and drawing some of the 
largest crowds that ever came together in that State to attend political 
meetings. The political interest of i860 seems to have returned to the 
people of Iowa. No political speaker ever met with warmer reception, 
or commanded more attention, in Ohio and Iowa, than General Logan 
has this fall. The people of those States seem to appreciate Illinois' 
Senator. 

Said the Bushnell Record, September 26th : 

The enthusiastic reception General Logan receives wherever he 
goes in other States indicates that he would be a very popular candi- 
date for a national office. 

Said the Belvidere Northwestern, of the same date : 

During the past week, General John A. Logan has been campaign- 
ing in Iowa, and everywhere he goes he does good service for the Re- 
publican Party and meets with a most enthusiastic welcome. We no- 
tice that many of the Republicans of that State consider him the "dark 
horse " in the Presidential contest next year. The people might go 
much farther and fare worse, and we believe that the ball once started 
in that direction, General Logan would become one of the strongest 
and most prominent candidates before the people for the Chief Magis- 
tracy. 

Said the Chicago Journal : 

Great crowds gather to hear General John A. Logan in Iowa. They 
like his plain, emphatic style of putting things. 

Said the Pontiac Sentinel, September 17th, under the 
heading " John A. Logan : " 

The ablest orator now speaking in the West is he whose name heads 
this item. In Ohio he gathered audiences such as no other man could 
gather, and charmed them with his silver-tongued eloquence in a way 
that no other man has done. In Iowa, he is addressing audiences of 
ten thousand people, hundreds of whom are soldier-boys that served 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 



277 



under the bold and gallant commander in the field. Everywhere that 
he goes, he creates an enthusiasm almost unparalleled. The boys in 
blue are overjoyed to see again the u Black Eagle," invincible in war, 
whom they followed over a hundred bloody fields to hard-won victories. 
Our Soldier-President, Grant, was one of the best that ever sat in the 
White House. He may be followed by another Soldier-President, 
Logan, equally brave and gifted. 

General Logan's Burlington speech was the last he 
could deliver in Iowa, as he was obliged to go on to Kansas, 
on business connected with the investigations of a Senate 
committee. 

LOGAN, IN 1879, ON THE RECIPROCAL DUTIES OF THE CITIZEN 
TO THE GOVERNMENT, AND THE GOVERNMENT TO THE CIT- 
IZEN. 

In a speech, delivered before the Union Veteran Club, at 
Chicago, November 13, 1879, General Logan said : 

I don't believe that the armies of the Union fought for the purpose 
of executing the laws against themselves, and letting them be unexecuted 
against others. I don't believe that the army of this Union fought for 
the protection of themselves under our Constitution and laws, and at 
the same time would withdraw the protection from others. I don't be- 
lieve that the protection of the Government belongs to the white man, 
or the man of any other color, exclusively. While this Constitution, 
by its Fourteenth amendment, makes every man a citizen of the United 
States ; while it makes him a citizen and clothes him with the power of 
citizenship everywhere in this country, at the same time it makes him a 
citizen it requires of him a duty to the Government, that whenever it 
calls for his services he is bound to obey that call. And while it puts this 
duty upon him, not only in war but in peace, there is a corresponding 
obligation growing out from this Constitution and this Government to 
that citizen. What is that, my countrymen ? It is, that while he is 
bound by this Government to perform all the duties of a citizen, this 
Government is bound to him to perform the duty of a nation. The 
government that fails to extend protection to its citizens in the exercise 
of their political rights, where it has the power to do it, fails in per- 
forming one of the most important duties that belong to a nation, and 
fails to survive and be perpetuated as a Nation. 



278 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



I say right here, and I want everyone to understand, that I am in 
favor of it myself ; and I am not in favor of any man or set of men, or 
parties, be they who they may, that will not extend the power of this 
Government for the preservation and peace and protection of its citi- 
zens in Illinois, or Mississippi, and elsewhere. The man or government 
that would force a man to vote contrary to his own judgment, does vio- 
lence to free institutions. A government — city, State, national or local 
— that will not protect its citizens at an election, be it general or local, 
in voting as they please, as well as it may or can, fails to perform its 
duty toward them. I don't mean that this Government can protect one 
man from being shot — of course not — where the murderer waylays 
him ; but I speak of its citizens, its communities, as bodies. So that, 
whenever in Chicago, or Illinois, a force, armed or otherwise, under- 
takes to deprive a community of citizens, or a body of citizens, from 
exercising their political rights in their own way, under the Constitu- 
tion and laws — if the power does not exist there to suppress it and 
protect the citizen, the Government is a failure. That is my notion of 
a nation. 

I want a government that gives me protection — protection to my 
life, my liberty, and my property, if I have any. That is what we 
started out to do in the origin of this Government. I feel, my com- 
rades, that this theory ought not to belong to any party. It ought not 
to be termed the theory of any political party. It ought to be the 
theory of every American citizen ; and the men who fought to destroy 
this Union, to-day ought to be the first men to embrace the doctrine 
that this is a Government with power to protect them, and that the 
power should be exercised. 

LOGAN SECURES THE REPUBLICAN NATIONAL CONVENTION OF 
l88o FOR CHICAGO A BRILLIANT FLANKING MOVEMENT. 

As another instance of the close care with which General 
Logan watched, and the skill with which he worked for, the 
interest of his State and people, may be mentioned the 
brilliant flank movement by which, in December, 1879, he 
secured for Chicago the honor of the Republican Convention 
of 1880, and at the same time himself named the chairman of 
the Republican National Committee. The Washington cor- 
respondent of the Philadelphia Press told the story as 
follows : 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 279 

To John A. Logan more than to any other man is Don Cameron 
indebted for his success. The Illinois Senator had set his heart upon 
having the next Republican Convention held in Chicago. But he 
feared that a strong movement would be made to bring it East, and 
was confirmed in this apprehension when he found, a while ago, that 
Philadelphia was being much talked of as the best place. He saw that 
the way to nip this movement in the bud was to bring out a Pennsyl- 
vania man for chairman, since, in that event, the State would hardly 
feel like asking the Convention also. He resolved, therefore, to bring 
out Cameron for the chairmanship, and the result was all that he 
desired. The Pennsylvania guns were spiked on the locality question, 
and not a lisp was heard to-day in advocacy of Philadelphia, while 
Logan's ticket of Cameron for chairman, and Chicago the place, swept 
the board. 

logan's able legal argument in the senate on the five- 
per-cent. claims of illinois and other states. 

Another powerful speech, during which he was subjected 
to frequent interruptions by some of the very ablest lawyers 
of the Senate, his ready responses to whom exhibited his 
legal acumen and skill in debate, was delivered February 20, 
1880, in the United States Senate on a bill "to authorize 
the Secretary of the Interior to ascertain the amount of land 
located with military warrants in the States described there- 
in, and for other purposes " — the question involved being the 
payment of the five-per-cent. claim of the State of Illinois 
and other States due to them on the sales or disposal of the 
public lands within their jurisdiction. It was a legal argu- 
ment, and was conceded by Senator Edmunds, — although 
not given to compliment and who took opposite ground, — to 
be a " very able argument." At its close Logan said : 

No, Mr. President, this contract, between the Government of the 
United States and these States, was entered into in good faith, on the 
part of the people at that time desiring the growth of this country, 
desiring that it should be peopled, that it should grow into great States. 
These inducements were held out to get people to organize State gov- 
ernments. They did it, and at the door of this National Government, 



2 8o LIFE OF LOGAN. 

for years back, these States have asked that justice be done in reference 
to this particular thing ; and it has been denied, because, forsooth, they 
say it will tax the people of this country ! So does money appropri- 
ated for the purpose of dredging out a harbor, which might be con- 
venient to the constituency of some senators and not of others. So 
does an appropriation for the great harbor of New York, tax the people 
of this country. So does an appropriation for our lakes and our rivers, 
tax the people of this country. But because, perhaps, one of the great 
arteries of this Nation does not wend its way through some of the 
States, is that any reason why a general fund should not be taken for 
the purpose of opening up the highway ? Is that the argument that is 
to be used in this Chamber ? If so, then the doctrine of the rights of 
States has gone so far that no one can vote for any appropriation un- 
less it applies peculiarly to his own State. 

Sir, we, it seems to me, as an American people, should look above 
and beyond this. This great country should be one country, one grand 
whole, where each and every man should be willing that his mite 
if necessary should be contributed for the general welfare, and that 
which is agreed to be honest and just between the Government and 
States, between individuals and individuals, should be kept sacred and 
considered binding. Good faith should be carried out on the part of all, 
and then there will be no reason for complaint. Each and every com- 
pact with a State should be kept in the most implicit good faith ; every- 
thing pertaining to the welfare of the people should be faithfully ful- 
filled, and our arguments, in my judgment, should be in that direction 
which would benefit the whole — not that " my State will not be bene- 
fited, if this thing is done for the East or for the South," but "the 
whole country will receive the benefit." So, too, in carrying out agree- 
ments and contracts ; if they are honest and just, we should all say, 
"Let them be carried out ; whether they benefit my State directly, or 
not, is immaterial ; if the faith of the Government is pledged, let the 
faith of the Government be kept." 

THE FITZ-JOHN PORTER CASE LOGAN'S WONDERFUL FOUR DAYS' 

SPEECH BEFORE A LISTENING SENATE AND CROWDED GAL- 
LERIES. 

Of the many great speeches made by General Logan, 
whether on the stump, before the courts, in the House, or in 
the Senate, perhaps the greatest of all was the famous four 
days' speech of March (2, 3, 4, and 5), 1880, on the bill to 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 28 1 

restore Fitz-John Porter to the army, — and pay him $60,000 
to boot, for back pay, — delivered before a listening Senate 
and crowded galleries throughout, with Blaine, and Conkling, 
and Edmunds, and Thurman, and General Sherman, and 
even Porter himself, giving absorbed attention to the marvel- 
lous array of military law-learning, facts, arguments, illustra- 
tion, denunciation, and appeal which poured from the eloquent 
lips of this warrior-statesman. It was likened, by the press, 
to the greatest effort of Tom Benton, in length and force, and 
the New York Tribune said of it: "Probably never before 
within the history of the Senate has a speech, lasting through 
the sessions of four days, been listened to with such atten- 
tion." And the result of that speech was the defeat of the 
bill in that Congress. Most extraordinary was the ease with 
which, at various stages of its delivery, when interrupted by 
such practised debaters and legal luminaries as Ben Hill, and 
Randolph, and Kernan, he unhorsed his adversaries in debate. 
It is impossible, of course, even to sketch this wonderful 
speech, this great legal argument, which covers no less than 
forty-six pages of the Congressional Record ' • but the protest 
with which the gifted Senator closed, may not inappropriately 
here be given. Said he : 

Then, sir, in conclusion, I say as an American citizen, as a senator 
of the United States, I do most sincerely and earnestly protest against 
the passage of this proposed bill. 

By every remembrance of gratitude and loyalty to those whose faith- 
ful devotion preserved their country, I must protest against this stu- 
pendous reward to him who, in the judgment of the court, faltered in 
duty and failed in honor in the hour of peril and climax of battle. 

I protest, because the precedent sought to be established would 
prove a source of unknown evils in the future. It would stand here- 
after as an incentive to military disobedience in the crisis of arms, and 
as assurance of forgiveness and emolument for the most dangerous 
crime a soldier can commit. 

I protest, because every sentence heretofore executed upon subor- 
dinates in the service, for minor offences, would stand as the record of 



282 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

a cruel tyranny, if this supreme crime is to be condoned and obliterated 
and its perpetrator restored to rank and rewarded with pay. 

I protest, because the spirit of patriotism, upon which alone we 
must rely in the Nation's need, hereafter will be shamed and subdued 
by inflicting this brand of condemnation upon those patriotic men who 
began and conducted the original proceedings and sanctioned the origi- 
nal sentence, as well as upon others, equally patriotic, who affirmed the 
sentence and refused to annul its just decree. 

I protest, because the money appropriated by this act will be money 
drawn from the Treasury in furtherance of an unauthorized purpose, 
and in defiance of the rules of law. 

I protest, because the bill is loaded with startling innovations. It 
overrides statutes, and is the exercise of unconstitutional power. It 
subverts the order of military promotion, and postpones the worthy to 
advance the unworthy. Its tendency is to applaud insubordination. 
Its effect will be to encourage dereliction of duty. The soldier and the 
civilian will alike feel its baneful influence ; for such an error, if once 
permitted to creep into our system of laws, can never be eradicated. 
Upon every motive for the public good, without one impulse personal 
to myself against the subject of this bill, with every proper remem- 
brance of the past tempered by every proper conciliation in the pres- 
ent, but looking sternly at the inevitable consequences in the future, I 
protest against this enactment as a duty I owe to the country which I 
cannot and would not avoid. 

As was before stated, General Logan had the satisfaction 
of knowing the obnoxious bill failed through his great effort. 

DEATH OF ZACH CHANDLER LOGAN'S IMPRESSIVE ACCOUNT OF 

HIS DEAD FRIEND'S LAST HOURS — AN ELOQUENT EULOGY. 

Few will forget the sad death, in the full ripeness of his 
powers, of Senator Zach Chandler of Michigan. Of all the 
orations delivered in the United States in memory of that 
stalwart statesman, none surpassed in interest or eloquence 
that delivered (January 28, 1880) by Senator Logan, as the 
following extract will show : 

He was not only a man of thought but of action ; he was generous, 
kind, true, and faithful ; his bosom welled up and overflowed with the 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 283 

milk of human kindness ; his heart was large enough to embrace within 
its sympathies all classes ; his watchword ever was, liberty and protec- 
tion to all. He was a patriot in the broadest sense in which that term 
is understood. During his country's severest trials, his services in her 
behalf, in giving aid and encouragement to the people of his own State, 
and in the councils of the Nation, by his bold and fearless course, were 
great. When the storm of secession was fiercest, he was boldest ; as 
trials came, he rose with the emergency ; in the darkest night, he was 
one of the most steadfast stars. Sir, he was by nature a leader and con- 
troller of men, possessing all the necessary qualities that would have 
fitted him for a great field-marshal — the energy, the boldness, the judg- 
ment, the decision, the courage, with the capacity for action and coun- 
sel. He was the builder of his own fortune, and the moulder of his own 
sentiments ; a man, sir, true and steadfast to his friends, and one who 
never begged quarter from an enemy. Yet he was just, at all times, 
to friend and foe. 

Mr. President, on the last day of his life, in company with one other 
gentleman, I came with him from Janesville, Wisconsin, to Chicago. 
He was apparently in excellent health. On the way, once he complained 
of slight indigestion. About twelve o'clock, I left him at the Grand 
Pacific Hotel. About five o'clock that afternoon I called at his room, 
and found him then in exceedingly good spirits, and looking in fine 
condition. At seven-thirty, he went to McCormick's Hall. There I 
sat by his side on the stage. About eight o'clock, he was introduced 
by the President of the Young Men's Auxiliary Club (Mr. Collier) to a 
grand audience composed of ladies and gentlemen. 

He commenced slowly, but warmed up with his subject until he be- 
came so eloquent and forcible in his language and illustrations that the 
audience, in the midst of his speech, arose with one accord and gave 
three cheers. No orator during an address in the city of Chicago ever 
received more marked attention or greater applause. He created an 
enthusiasm that carried all along with it, like the rushing force of a 
mighty storm. This, sir, was the grandest triumph of his life, and he 
felt it to be so. * 

He stood forth before that grand audience like a giant, and with 
full-volumed voice spoke like a Webster, or a Douglas. His words 
were well chosen ; his sentences terse and complete, abounding in wit, 
humor, and happy local hits ; his logic came like hot shot in the din of 
battle, crashing through the oaks of the forest. One of his last sentences 
still rings in my ears — " Shut up your stores, shut up your manufactories, 
and go to work for your country." The effect of this last speech of 



284 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



Senator Chandler was electrical ; its influence is still felt among the 
business men of Chicago. The meeting adjourned with great demon- 
strations in favor of the speaker. He left the hall and went directly to 
his room, and soon retired to rest. 

The next morning I was sitting with my family at breakfast in the 
Palmer House ; a gentleman came into the dining-room in great haste 
and spoke to me, saying, " Logan, your friend is dead — found in his 
room dead." 

Sir, I arose and bowed my head ; my heart was filled with grief and 
sorrow. I repaired at once to the room occupied by the Senator, in the 
Grand Pacific Hotel, and there, sir, he lay, in the cold and icy embrace 
of death. 

Yes, sir, dead ! He is gone from us. We will hear him no more ; 
his voice is hushed in silence forever. In his room, no one being present 
with him, in the lonely and solemn gloom of the night, he had passed 
from life unto death, and in such a peaceful manner that the angel of 
death must have whispered the message so softly and gently that he 
knew not his coming. But, sir, what a shock it was to the living ! As 
the fall of the stalwart oak causes a trembling in the surrounding forest, 
so did the fall of Senator Chandler cause the tender chords of the hearts 
of this people to vibrate with the tender touch of sympathy everywhere. 

Well might his friends weep at their own, as well as their country's, 
loss. Indeed, he was a man of whom all may speak in praise, and upon 
whose bier all may drop the tear of sorrow. When earth received him, 
she took to her bosom one of her manly sons ; and when paradise bade 
his spirit come, a noble one entered there. 

Mr. President, time brings lessons which teach us that hope does not 
perish when the stars of life refuse longer to give light. 

The death of our brother-Senator, and those still closely following 
him, should constantly warn us of the fact that we are travelling to "the 
undiscovered country from whose bourn no traveller returns." 'Tis 
true the grave in its silence gives forth no voice, no whispers of the 
morrow ; but there is a voice borne upon the lips of the morning 
zephyrs that lets fall a whisper, quickening the heart with a knowledge 
that there is an abode beyond the tomb. Sir, our lamps are burning 
now, some more brightly than others ; some shed their light from the 
mountain's top, others from the lowly vales ; but let us so trim them 
that they may all burn with equal brilliancy when relighted in the 
mansions beyond the mysterious river. 

I fondly hope, sir, that there we will again meet our departed 
friend. 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 285 

THE LOGAN BOOM IN l88o— HIS SELF-ABNEGATING FIGHT FOR 

GRANT GARFIELD MOVED TO TEARS BY LOGAN'S EARLY 

SUPPORT HIS WONDERFUL PERSONAL CAMPAIGN IN l88o 

HE STRIVES TO MAKE PEACE BETWEEN CONKLING AND 
PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 

Early in 1880, in consequence largely of the effect pro- 
duced by his wonderful effort in the Fitz-John Porter case, a 
Logan Presidential "boom" started, which he himself nipped 
in the bud. He declared for his old commander Grant as 
beino- the most available man to nominate, and thus avert the 
calamity of a "Solid South." In an interview published 
May 17, 1880, in the Chicago Daily News, he said: 

I am in favor of the nomination of General Grant for the Presidency 
simply and only because he is the strongest and most available man in 
the contest. I am not making war upon any of the rival candidates. 
No man has heard me saya cruel or unjustifiable word about Mr. 
Blaine, Mr. Sherman, or indeed any of the gentlemen whose names have 
been mentioned as candidates. That I am against them is true, but 
only because I am for Grant. 

As to his own " boom " and an intimation that he was 
" trying to play the part of dark-horse in the contest," he at 
once wrote a manly letter for publication in which he said : 
"I never play 'hide-and-seek' in politics. When I wish to 
be a candidate I say so, and make a square and honorable 
fight for the prize. ... I never have second choices ; the 
man that I am for, is my choice always, unless defeated ; then 
the choice made by my friends becomes my choice." And the 
Chicago Jotirnal, commenting on his frank and manly letter, 
said: "He is a stalwart Grant man, standing by his great 
commander now with the same chivalric spirit which pre- 
vented him from assuming command of Thomas' army on 
the eve of victory, as he could have done under his instruc- 
tions." How nobly he carried out the promise of that 



2 86 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

letter ! * When Garfield received a majority of the votes at 
the Chicago Convention, it was Logan who so warmly and 
fervently seconded the motion to make the vote for him 
unanimous, and who was the first to promise that he, with 
the Garfield men, would "go forward in this contest, not 
with tied hands, not with sealed lips, not with bridled 
tongues, but to speak the truth in favor of the grandest party 
that has ever been organized in this country ; to maintain 
its principles, to maintain its power, to preserve its ascen- 
dency." He was the first, also, of the "Stalwarts" to take 
the stump for Garfield. At the ratification meeting, June 16, 
1880, in Washington, it was Garfield's eye that saw Logan 
in the crowd, and Garfield's hand that beckoned him to come 
up, and Garfield's voice that asked him to say a word on that 
occasion, and that exclaimed, " Thank God, Jack's up ! " when 
he stood up before the multitude. The Washington Star 
briefly tells what followed : " General Logan was here recog- 
nized, and for ten minutes the applause was deafening. When 
quiet had been partially restored, General Logan said : ' If 
anyone desired to know who his first and last choice was, he 
would answer: The nominee of the Republican Party. The 
candidate who now bore its banner was all that he or the peo- 
ple could desire. If the people of this country desired a born 
leader, they had it in the person of James A. Garfield. No 
matter who the first or second choice had been ; let the only 
choice now be the nominee. All sores should be healed, 
and there should be no feeling save one of success ; and to 
his old comrades he would say : Touch elbows on the march, 
and press forward to certain victory.' General Logan re- 
tired amid loud applause, and the assemblage dispersed." 
And those who were on the spot will remember that Garfield 
was moved to tears as he thanked Logan for his hearty sup- 
port. In an interview, in the New York Tribune of June 

* How he "thrice refused the crown" himself, at this convention, may be gathered 
from the Addenda, at the end of this biography. 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 287 

23d, he again declared that he would give Garfield the hearti- 
est support, and that he would go on the stump for him. 
Early in July, the Republican National Committee placed him 
at the head of the Executive Committee in charge of the 
Republican campaign in the West, and, within a week there- 
after, he opened the campaign in Illinois with a ringing two 
hours' speech in Murphysboro' — a great speech, covering the 
records of both parties, elaborate, exhaustive, direct, and con- 
vincing, — before an audience larger than had ever before been 
seen there at a political meeting. " Logan," said one who 
knew, " was the man who drew Conkling and Grant to the 
support of Garfield, and arranged the Mentor meeting. He 
neither sulked nor lamented. He was the first of the Stal- 
warts to take off his coat, and mount the stump for Garfield. 
His labors in this State [Illinois] were little short of hercu- 
lean. He spoke night and day, and his speeches — plain, 
practical, destitute of rhetorical flourishes, and dealing in the 
questions that were asked during the canvass — had an im- 
mense effect upon his auditors." From the beginning of the 
campaign to its close in November, besides his other labors, 
and in addition to in-door addresses, he made more than sixty 
out-door speeches, to audiences ranging from a few thousands 
up to forty thousand ! Ovation after ovation signalized his 
appearance everywhere. Said a special telegram from Pitts- 
field, to the Inter- Ocean of November 1st, after alluding to his 
speech there, the previous evening: "Thus ends one of the 
most remarkable personal campaigns ever made. Senator 
Logan has made over sixty open-air speeches, extending from 
Maine to Illinois. He spoke in Indiana nearly a month, al- 
most every day, and one day, at railroad stations, made no 
less than nine different short speeches." True to Garfield the 
Republican nominee, he was true also to Garfield the Repub- 
lican President. After Garfield's inauguration, when troubles 
arose within the party, Logan supported the Administration 
cordially. As has been well said by another, " While not as- 



2 88 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

sailing his friend Conkling, he yet gave him no encouragement 
in his contest with the President. He rather assumed the 
attitude of a peace-maker, and sought to heal all wounds and 
put an end to all dissensions in the party." 

INSINUATIONS AGAINST LOGAN'S LOYALTY BEFORE THE WAR 

HIS TRIUMPHANT SPEECH OF VINDICATION IN l88l DEMO- 
CRATIC AND REPUBLICAN SENATORS FOLLOW IT WITH THEIR 
OWN PERSONAL TESTIMONY. 

In an early part of this work the base charge that Logan 
was not loyal before the war has been briefly touched on. 
It may be well here to touch on it more fully. As was then 
remarked, the only man that ever dared insinuate to Logan's 
face * that he was a secession sympathizer before the war, 
was Senator Ben Hill of Georgia, in the United States Sen- 
ate Chamber, March 30, 1881 ; and Logan instantly retorted: 
"Any man who insinuates that I sympathized with it at that 
time, insinuates what is false," and Senator Hill at once re- 
tracted the insinuation. Subsequently, April 19, 1881, Sen- 
ator Logan, in a speech fortified with indisputable record 

* Says a correspondent, writing since Logan's death, in the Cincinnati Commercial : 
In 1876, during the Hayes-Tilden campaign, I attended a political meeting, addressed by 
General Logan, at La Harpe, 111. After Logan had concluded his speech and taken his 
seat, someone from the crowd arose and requested of Logan the liberty of asking him a 
question. Logan, of course, very promptly and courteously granted the request. 

" The question," said the gentleman, " I wish to ask you is this : 

"On my way to the meeting this morning, on board the cars, there was a gentleman 
who claimed to have been raised in Southern Illinois, and well acquainted with you. He 
said that in the beginning of the war you raised a company of men to go into the rebel 
army, and I take this public opportunity of asking you if that is so? " 

General Logan eyed his interrogator a moment, his eyes flashing fire, and the whole 
expression of his face indicating the terrible passion within, and glancing for a moment 
over the crowd of people who stood breathlessly waiting for the answer of the General, he 
asked : 

" Is the man who told you that present ?" 

The gentleman from the audience replied : "I think he did not stop off." 

"I am sorry," said Logan, "for I would like to meet him face to face, and tell 
him that he, or any other man, that charged me with that in seriousness is a liar, an 
infernal scoundrel, and a coward, and he dares not face me in the assertion." 

He took his seat with no further words, amid the wildest excitement and enthusiasm. 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 289 

and documentary evidence, forever set at rest the atrocious 
calumny. From that record it appears : that, on December 
17, i860, while still a Douglas Democrat, immediately after 
Lincoln's election, and long- before his inauguration, before 
even the first gun of the war was fired, Mr. Logan, then a 
representative in the House, voted affirmatively on a resolu- 
tion, offered by Morris of Illinois, which declared an " im- 
movable attachment" to "our National Union," and "that it 
is our patriotic duty to stand by it as our hope in peace and 
our defence in war;" that, on January 7, 1861, Mr. Adrian 
having offered the following: "Resolved, That we fully 
approve of the bold and patriotic act of Major Anderson 
in withdrawing from Fort Moultrie to Fort Sumter, and of 
the determination of the President to maintain that fearless 
officer in his present position ; and that we will support the 
President in all constitutional measures to enforce the laws 
and preserve the Union " — Mr. Logan, in casting his vote, 
said: "As the resolution receives my unqualified approval, I 
vote 'Aye;'" and that, further, on February 5, 1861, before 
the inauguration of President Lincoln, in a speech made by 
Logan in the House in favor of the Crittenden Compromise 
measures, he used the following language touching secession : 

Sir, I have always denied, and do yet deny, the right of secession. There 
is no warrant for it in the Constitution. It is wrong, it is unlawful, un- 
constitutional, and should be called by the right name — revolution. No 
good, sir, can result from it, but much mischief may. It is no remedy 
for any grievances. I hold that all grievances can be much easier re- 
dressed inside the Union than out of it. 

In that same speech he also eloquently said : 

I have been taught that the preservation of this glorious Union, 
with its broad flag waving over us as the shield for our protection on 
land and on sea, is paramount to all the parties and platforms that ever 
have existed or ever can exist. I would to-day, if I had the power, sink 
my own party and every other one, with all their platforms, into the 
vortex of ruin, without heaving a sigh or shedding a tear, to save the 
Union, or even stop the revolution where it is. 
19 



290 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



In this most complete speech of vindication — which Sena- 
tor Logan said he put upon record, " First, that my children 
after me may not have these slanders thrown in their faces 
without the power of dispelling or refuting them; and second, 
that it may endure in this Senate Chamber, so that it may be 
a notice to Senators of all parties and all creeds that here- 
after, while I am here in this Senate, no insinuation of that 
kind will be submitted to by me," — the proofs of the falsity of 
the charge were piled mountain-high, and among them the 
following voluntary statements from two Democratic Senators 
who were with him before the War, in the House of Repre- 
sentatives : 

United States Senate Chamber, 
Washington, April 14, 1881. 

Dear Sir : In a discussion in the Senate a few weeks since you re- 
ferred to the fact that a Southern Senator, who had served with you in 
Congress before the war, could testify that during your term of service 
there you gave no encouragement to the secession of the Southern 
States, adding, however, that you did not ask such testimony. I was not 
sure at the time that your reference was to me, as Senator Pugh of 
Alabama was also a member of that Congress. 

Since then, having learned that your reference was to me, I propose 
on the floor of the Senate, should suitable occasion offer, to state what 
I knew of your position and views at the time referred to. But, as I 
may be absent from the Senate for some time, I deem it best to give you 
this written statement, with full authority to use it in any way that seems 
proper to you. 

When you first came to Congress in you were a verv ardent 

and impetuous Democrat. In the division which took place between 
Mr. Douglas and his friends on the one hand and the Southern Demo- 
crats on the other, you were a warm and uncompromising supporter of 
Mr. Douglas ; and in the course of that contention you became some- 
what estranged from your party associates in the South. In our fre- 
quent discussions upon the subjects of difference, I never heard a word 
of sympathy from your lips with secession in either theory or practice. 
On the contrary, you were vehement in your opposition to it. I remem- 
ber well a conversation I had with you just before leaving Washington 
to become a candidate for the Secession Convention. You expressed 
the deep regret you felt at my proposed action, and deplored the con- 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 



291 



templated movement in terms as strong as any I heard from any Re- 
publican. Yours truly, 

L. Q. C. Lamar. 
Hon. John A. Logan, United States Senate, Washington, D. C. 

Senate Chamber, April 14, 1881. 
Having read the above statement of Senator Lamar, I fully concur 
with him in my recollection of your expressions and action in opposi- 
tion to secession. Truly yours, 

• J. L. Pugh. 

At the conclusion of Senator Logan's speech of refutation 
Senator Brown of Georgia (Democrat) said : 

Our newspapers may have misrepresented his position. I am now 
satisfied they did. I have heard the Senator's statement with great interest, 
and I take pleasure in saying — for I had some idea before that there was 
some shadow of truth in this report — that I think his vindication is full, 
complete, and conclusive. I recollect very well during the war, when I was 
Governor of my State and the Federal army was invading it, to have had 
a large force of militia aiding the Confederate army, and that General 
Logan was considered by us as one of the ablest, most gallant, and skil- 
ful leaders of the Federal army. We had occasion to feel his power, 
and we learned to respect him. 

Senator Beck, of Kentucky (Democrat); referring to the 
fact that he [Beck] was kept out of the House at one time, 
and a great many suggestions had been made to him as to 
General Logan, continued: 

As I said the other day, I never proposed to go into such things and 
never have done so ; but at that time General Frank Blair was here, 
and I submitted many of the papers I received, to him, — I never thought 
of using any of them, — and I remember the remark that he made to 
me, "Beck, John Logan was one of the hardest fighters of the war; and 
when men who were seeking to whistle him down the wind because of 
his politics when the war began, were snugly fixed in safe places, he was 
taking his life in his hand wherever the danger was greatest — " and I 
tore up every paper I got, and burnt it in the fire before his eyes. 

Senator Dawes, of Massachusetts (Republican), also took 
occasion to say : 

Mr. President, I do not know that anything which can be said on 
this side would be of any consequence to the Senator from Illinois in this 
matter. But I came into the House of Representatives at the same 



292 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



session that the Senator did : he was at that time one of the most intense 
of Democrats, and I was there with him when the Rebellion first took 
root and manifested itself in open and flagrant war ; and I wish to say- 
as a Republican of that day, when the Senator from Illinois was a Demo- 
crat, that at the earliest possible moment, when the Republican Party 
was in anxiety as to the position of the Northern Democracy on the 
question of forcible assault on the Union, nothing did they hail with 
more delight than the early stand which the Senator from Illinois, from 
the Democratic side of the House, took upon the question of resistance 
to the Government of the United States. I feel that it is right that I 
should state that he was among the first, if not the very first, of the Northern 
Democrats who came out and openly declared, whatever may have been their 
opinion about the doctrines of the Repiiblican Party, that when it came to a ques- 
tion of forcible resistance, they should be counted on the side of the Government 
and in co-operation with the Republican Party in the attempt to maintain its 
authority. 

I am very glad, whether it may be of any service or not, to bear this 
testimony to the early stand the Senator from Illinois took while he was 
still a Democrat, and the large influence he exerted upon the Northern Democ- 
racy, which kept it from being involved in the condition and in the work of the 
Southern Democracy at that time. 

GRANT'S DEFENCE OF FITZ-JOHN PORTER LOGAN SHOWS IT TO 

BE FOUNDED ON A MISAPPREHENSION OF THE REAL FACTS. 

In the North American Review there appeared, late in 
1 88 1, an article written by General Grant in justification of 
the conduct of Fitz-John Porter in disobeying the orders of 
General Pope, his commanding officer, on the 27th, 28th, 
and 29th of August, 1862. To this article General Logan, 
through the Chicago Tribune of November, 1881, made a 
most forcible and convincing reply, covering four columns of 
small type in that paper, which opened in the following 
modest yet manly way : 

I dislike very much to enter into any discussion with General Grant 
on matters pertaining to military movements, as I must do so knowing 
I am contesting ground with a man of great military renown. But 
inasmuch as General Grant has so recently changed his opinion on this 
subject, after having the case before him when General of the Army, 
and during eight years while President of the United States, based upon 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 293 

Porter's own statement of the case, and after careful examination of the 
case concluded that he was guilty, and having more than once im- 
pressed his own opinion upon my mind, which very strongly confirmed 
me in my own conclusions of Porter's guilt, therefore I take it that the 
General's generosity will be sufficient to pardon me if I shall now differ 
with him, and trust my own judgment in the case instead of accepting 
his present conclusions — especially when I feel confident that I can 
clearly demonstrate that his present opinions are based upon a misappre- 
hension of the facts as they did exist and were understood by those 
investigating them at the time.* 

* A staff-writer of the New York Tribune, in its issue of January 2, 1887, says : 
" General James A. Hall, of Maine, who has been a prominent orator in Republican 
National campaigns for many years, has been here on business for some days. He is a stout 
man with a florid face, sandy moustache and reddish hair. In conversation about General 
Logan the other day the Fitz-John Porter case was recalled, when General Hall said : ' The 
greatest thing in Logan's civil career was, I think, the fight he made against the restoration 
of Fitz-John Porter to the Army. A record of the Porter trial has just been published by 
the Government in the official history of the War of the Rebellion. I took down the 
volumes that contained it a few days ago, and sat down to a careful investigation and 
perusal of the Porter case. I said to myself that I would forget that I had taken part in 
that campaign, and I would find the man innocent if it was a possible thing from the records. 
The first thing that I struck was Porter's letters to Burnside making complaints about the 
direction of the army. Then I saw the man's animus. When I got to the place where 
they harped continually and incessantly about the darkness of the night and the terrible 
condition of the road, I got disgusted. I knew every foot of that ground, and it was an 
August night. There was a railroad on which the men could march, flanked on either side 
by a road which the artillery could easily have travelled. There might have been ' chuck 
holes ' where it would have been necessary to put on additional horses to pull out the can- 
non. But the roads were sufficient. I finally gave the case up and my old judgment stands 
that Porter was properly convicted.' 

" I said to General Hall that public opinion had largely reversed itself in the Fitz-John 
Porter case on account of General Grant's position, when he replied : 'That is one of the 
inexplicable things in General Grant's history. We have a man up in our State, Joshua L. 
Chamberlain, who became Governor of Maine. He was recommended for promotion to a 
general's position, after he had been terribly wounded in battle. The recommendation 
was by General Grant. He belonged to the Fifth Army Corps, and at the annual meetings 
of the Fifth Army Corps for a number of years resolutions were passed requesting the Presi- 
dent to reopen the Fitz-John Porter case. After one of these meetings Governor Chamber- 
lain was deputed to take the resolutions to General Grant. They were old comrades and 
the General invited him to breakfast. There the Governor explained his mission and offered 
to present the papers. General Grant said to him : ' The friends of General Porter make 
a mistake in pressing for a reopening of that case. I have been through it seven or eight 
times carefully. They do not want it reopened. They had better let it alone. It will be 
worse for him if it is reopened.' Governor Chamberlain took the copy of the resolutions 
from his pocket and made a memorandum of this on the back of the paper. It is in his 
library to-day in Maine.' " 



294 LIFE 0F LOGAN. 

This is given merely to show how much of modesty and 
manliness, as well as courage, was characteristic of Logan. 
And surely it required courage of no small degree — courage 
of conviction in the highest degree — thus to take issue with 
his old friend and great commander. But the whole history 
of Logan's life, military and civil, before the war, during the 
war, and since the war, shows that he followed old David 
Crockett's maxim, " Be sure you're right, and then go ahead." 

logan's speech on the bill to retire general grant — 
he " rattles " the confederate brigadiers again — a 
fine tribute to grant's military genius. 

In discussing the bill to place General Grant on the re- 
tired list of the army (1881 or 1882) Senator Logan stood 
up manfully for his old General, and said to the Democratic 
Senators : 

You say you have nothing personal against him. If there is nothing 
personal against him, you have done the very same thing for others that 
is asked to be done for him. If you have done the same thing for 
others, why not for him ? If you cannot do it for him, why not ? Is it 
on account of politics ? Oh, no. Is it because he fought against you ? 
Not that. But what then ? In God's name, tell me what it is. I want 
to know. I ask some Senator to tell me what is the reason. When I 
show you that it is not because there is no precedent for it, for there is, 
then tell me the reason ; I should like to know it. I say to Senators on 
the other side of the Chamber — for I certainly feel kindly to all Sen- 
ators here — I have no bitter prejudices ; I can treat any Senator on that 
side of the Chamber with the same cordiality and friendship that I can 
a Senator on this side — that I am only sorry to see (and I say it from 
the bottom of my heart) the prejudice still lingering in the bosoms of 
some gentlemen on that side of the Chamber against a man who accom- 
plished great things for the success of this Union. The success of this 
country, Senators on that side of the Chamber, was yours. When I say 
"your success," I mean, by that, it was the making of your country in 
the future. You will receive part of the glory of the achievements of 
this man in the building up of your portion of the United States here- 
after, by entertaining different notions, by going forward on a different 
line, and by teaching the people that all must unite, and that each and 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 295 

every man must live by his own energy and labor ; so the sooner these 
prejudices die out — the sooner they are not permitted longer to show 
themselves in this Chamber, or at the other end of the Capitol, — the 
better it will be for all. 

Fitz-John Porter, as he stands before you, you are willing to restore 
to the army ; dismissed the service, dishonorably discharged ; the dis- 
missal signed by Lincoln ; the dismissal agreed to by Garfield ; the 
man who caused the loss of a battle by not doing his duty — you would 
restore him to a place on the retired list, and yet you would refuse to 
retire General Grant, the man to whom we owe more for the salvation 
of this country than to any other military man ! 

Well, who is Grant ? Grant was a little quiet man, far off in a little 
remote village, almost unknown in this country when the war broke 
out. In the West he moved forward from the rank of colonel until he 
was placed in command of the army ; in every battle that he fought, he 
showed himself a genius in military science. In the East, when the 
thundering of the artillery was heard on the hills not distant 
from the capital, when General McClellan failed of success — I will 
not say on account of want of ability ; it may have been his misfortune, 
but he did fail of success — when your Fitz-John Porter held back and 
disobeyed orders, when the armies against the Union were thundering 
at the very gates of the capital, Grant, after his successes in the West, 
was called by Abraham Lincoln to take charge of all the armies of the 
United States. He came, a modest man, with his long blue coat, made 
for a private soldier, over his uniform. He went to the White House, 
and received his instructions. He went down to the front, and took 
command of the army that had been defeated and driven back every- 
where. He snatched victory from the jaws of defeat ; he crushed 
treason and rebellion wherever they raised their head. By this genius 
of Grant, the old flag of our fathers and of this country was unfurled 
from the house-tops and the hill-tops, and the songs of the Union were 
echoed in the valleys, until the people of this land, from one end to the 
other, shouted "Amen!" to the success of this little man Grant, to 
whom to-day you refuse this recognition. 

On the walls of this Capitol, on the 22d day of May, 1865 — I wit- 
nessed it myself — the loyal hand of this country had placed, " We owe 
a debt of gratitude to the Union soldier that future generations can 
never pay." That was the sentiment, then, of the people of this land. 
To whom more than any other man did we owe that debt ? To Ulysses 
S. Grant more than to any other man in this Nation who had to do 
with the army of this country. Yet you cannot afford to put him on 
the retired list of the army ! 



296 LIFE OF LOGAN. 



SPEECH ON ARREARAGES OF PENSIONS — HE DEFENDS THE BILL 
IN THE SENATE, IN WORDS THAT REACHED THE HEART OF 
EVERY SOLDIER. 

During the winter of 1881-82, the Pension Appropriation 
Bill being before the Senate, Senator Logan replied to the 
attacks made upon the bill because of the amount of the pen- 
sion-list being "enormous." Said he: 

Of course it is enormous. There are many other things that are 
enormous ; many other of our appropriations in other directions are 
very large. There are many things in regard to which we might say 
Congress is appropriating a large amount of money where there is 
not half as much merit as there is in the pension-roll. It is true we 
appropriate $100,000,000, or a little more, this year. We appropriate 
it because we owe it ; that is the reason why. In other cases we appro- 
priate that which we do not owe, but appropriate for things that we 
propose to do. This is an appropriation for an account accumulated 
against the Government of the United States, where the debt exists to- 
day by reason of passing on these claims by the Commissioner of Pen- 
sions under the law. Hence we appropriate for that which we owe, 
that which has been adjudged against us. I ask why, then, should a 
raid be made on that, any more than on an appropriation that is made 
to pay the judgment of a court that has decided in reference to a claim, 
or something of that character? I cannot understand it. 

Mr. President, there is something about this, that many persons do 
not understand. I know a great many persons who are the recipients 
of pensions. Whether they are entitled to them or not I cannot say, 
because I did not make the examination. I know persons, who draw 
pensions, who look as if they are stout and healthy men ; but at the 
same time I have no doubt they are entitled to pensions. I could illus- 
trate this by members on this floor. I know three Senators on this floor, 
to-day, who are suffering from wounds they received in the army ; but 
yet they do not draw pensions, they do not ask for pensions. To look 
at those men there is not a man in the Senate who would suppose that 
either one of them could obtain a pension if he would try ; yet they 
could without any trouble, and I know that they suffer, and are confined 
frequently to their beds, from the effects of their military service. Yet 
nobody would suppose they were entitled to be pensioners. 

Therefore I conclude that there are many persons, drawing pensions 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 297 

in this country, whose wounds are covered by their garments and are 
unseen, wounds which are painful to them. And because such a man is 
going around, people say he is not entitled to a pension! That is the 
reason why there is so much criticism on the pension-list. I know an 
ex-officer of the army here, in Washington City, to-day. He comes into 
the Senate very frequently. He is a pensioner. I suppose if any Sena- 
tor were to see him, he would say that man is a fraud. I know he is 
not a fraud, and I will tell you why. That man to-day is as healthy- 
looking a man as you or I, and yet that man wears a seton in his body 
running through from side to side, and he has done so ever since the 
war. He has to do it in order to keep the wound open, to preserve his 
life, and that man is as healthy-looking a man as I am. But his wounds 
are concealed, and many persons say that he is a fraud. I know he is 
not a fraud. I know he is not able to-day to perform any labor of any 
kind, and yet he walks around a healthy-looking man. 

I mieht srive a number of instances of the same kind. I know others 
similarly situated. I know a Senator on this floor to-day who has a 
wound which breaks out frequently, yet he says nothing about it ; you 
do not know anything about it. He suffers intense pain from it at 
times, and has a physician sometimes to examine it, and to re-dress it, 
and heal it up again ; yet he never asks for a pension, and says nothing 
about his wounds. There are many cases of this kind all over the 
country. 

Men who do not understand this thing, men who have not served in 
the army on either side, men who do not know anything about camp- 
life and the service of men in the wars of this country, are not alto- 
gether competent to judge of those who have performed such service. 
I say that, in all kindness. There is not a man, within the sound of my 
voice, who served either in the Union army or the Confederate army, 
but will agree with me in the statement that no man who did not see 
service can tell the effect of service upon those who rendered it. 

What I intended was merely to call the attention of the Senate to 
the fact that the provision that the pension should attach at the time 
of the presentation of the case, instead of at the time when the injury 
was received, was the fault of Congress at the time that law was enacted ; 
so that the law giving arrears of pension is merely an amendment to 
that law, saying that the pension shall attach at the time the disability 
was incurred, at the time the soldier was shot down in line, instead of 
ten years afterward, that being the time the injury was inflicted. It is 
merely doing that which Congress should have done at the time they 
passed the Pension Act, dating the pension from the time the injury 
occurred, instead of at any other time. It is merely, then, the correc- 



298 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

tion of an error that grew up at the time in Congress when the act 
was passed, and is not an error itself because of the amount that is ex- 
pended. 

logan's bill devoting internal revenue to education — 

his statesmanlike views on the subject a grand and 

instructive speech. 

We have already seen, as far back as his great speech at 
Louisville, Ky., at the close of the war, that General Logan 
was even then revolving in his mind, not only the duty of the 
Nation to enlighten and civilize the barbarously ignorant 
race that it had converted into freemen, but the prime neces- 
sity of educating the masses everywhere in the land. He 
had then said : " We look in vain through the Southern States 
for public schools," and that " in the rural regions of the 
South the people are frequently found in whole communities 
totally destitute of the simplest rudiments of an English edu- 
cation." He was convinced that the corner-stone of civiliza- 
tion is education. How then to make education coextensive 
with the boundaries of his native land was a problem which 
might well engage the best efforts of our noblest statesmen 
to properly solve. In all his multitudinous labors in other 
fields of mental activity, this problem was ever recurring to 
his mind as that which would have grander results to the 
future of this Nation than any yet seen ; that would indeed 
more thoroughly and rapidly than any other class of legisla- 
tion carry out the magnificent scheme of the founders and 
fathers of the Republic in securing "the greatest good to the 
greatest number." But how to do it ? Therein lay the chief 
difficulty. At last, in March, 1882, Senator Logan, having 
reached his own solution of the difficulty, introduced to the 
Senate, and had referred to the Committee on Education 
and Labor, (of which Senator Blair was and is the chairman), 
a bill, of which the following is a copy : 

Be it enacted, etc., That from and after the passage of this act the 
entire income derived from the internal-revenue taxes on the manufact- 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 299 

ure and sale of distilled spirits shall be appropriated and expended for 
the education of all the children living in the United States. 

Sec. 2. That the money so received shall be expended pro rata in 
the several States and Territories, as shown by the census of 1880 and 
each succeeding census. 

Sec. 3. That the education hereby contemplated shall include such 
instruction as is provided in the curriculum of the public schools of the 
country, and also the establishment and maintenance of normal schools, 
teachers' institutes, and instruction in the industrial and mechanical 
arts. 

Sec. 4. That any State or Territory, before receiving the benefits of 
this act, shall be required, by local enactment, to make obligatory upon 
all children between the ages of seven and twelve years school-attend- 
ance for at least six months in each year. 

Sec. 5. That the Secretary of the Interior is charged with the proper 
administration of this law, through the Commissioner of Education ; and 
they are authorized and directed, under the approval of the President, 
to make all needful rules and regulations to carry this law into effect. 

Sec. 6. That no part of this fund shall be used for the erection of 
school-houses or buildings of any kind for school purposes. 

On the 1 6th of that month, Senator Logan made a speech 
upon his bill which attracted public attention and public com- 
ment, throughout the country, to a remarkable degree. It 
was a grand speech, worthy of the man and his great and 
patriotic purpose — a speech which every lover of his country 
should read— full of statements and statistics bearing upon 
the question ; and logical reasoning, and ripe wisdom, and 
patriotic appeal founded thereon. It has, in fact, been the 
backbone of all the debates that have since taken place in 
Congress upon this or other measures having similar aims, 
and, furthermore, it has resulted in accomplished legislation 
so far as the United States Senate is concerned. It is rarely 
that the reader can find matter that will so richly repay peru- 
sal as the following extract from the close of this great and 
successful patriotic effort : 

Nations are counted great and remembered chiefly for two things — 
wisdom and power : the former the property of the few ; the latter the 
property of the many, though wielded by the few. The ancients aimed 



3 oo LIFE OF LOGAN. 

to confine knowledge to a select class, and to make it, so far as possible, 
an inheritance transmissible to their descendants. The enlightened 
moderns seek to make it the common heritage of all. They search for 
all the specimens of mind, even to the shreds of it found in idiots, and 
cultivate all these. Why? Because every mind is an element of power. 
Private individuals ransack the streams and the mountains for particles 
of gold, and offer them to the world as an addition to its wealth ; but a 
nation finds honor in discovering minds, and offering them to be used 
in all the duties of life. Des Cartes was accustomed to say, " In the uni- 
verse there is nothing great but man, and in man there is nothing great 
but mind," — an expression afterward condensed and improved by Sir 
William Hamilton thus : " In the universe nothing is great but mind." 

Our systems of public schools give emphasis to this idea, and justify 
the search alluded to. A nation may honorably seek power ; indeed, if 
it is to live, it must seek and retain power. Those who are to constitute 
the power of the nation are the children scattered in the palaces, garrets, 
and cellars of cities, and in the homes and cabins of the country, from 
the Atlantic seaboard to the Pacific shore. Whatever force there shall 
be, therefore, to do or direct, must be found in these children. Their 
tide, growing with every advancing year, must supply for the future of 
our nation all its wealth, all its science, all its power, all its honor. 

It may be assumed that, as the present generation shall receive and 
educate its children, and welcome the annual swarms of immigrants 
crowding to our shores, so will the land increase in all that maks a peo- 
ple worthy of everlasting remembrance. 

And the same conditions which secure this, will also establish our 
country in all that a free people can desire — power, honor, comfort, in- 
telligence, and wealth. What some of these conditions are, it is not 
hard to declare ; for knowledge, universally diffused, is so clearly the 
great force, that even a statement to this effect is unnecessary. That 
"knowledge is power" is a truism now denied by none. 

What is of so much worth as children, even reckoning, on that very 
low plane, their simple cash value as prospective laborers ? A fine 
climate gives effect to every interest and industry of a land ; a fertile 
soil attracts population and enterprise to cultivate it ; mines afford 
opportunity for the poor to gather wealth and scatter it abroad through- 
out the world. But none of these are of any more worth than a desert, 
without hands to improve them ; and what are hands worth, without 
minds to direct them ? A hand, with an educated brain behind it, is 
worth more than treble an ignorant one. Give the finest climate earth 
can show, the fattest soil the continents lift out of the sea, the richest 
mines the mountains contain, the safest harbors that border the sea or 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 



301 



indent the land, and let a people be ignorant of their own capabilities, 
or of the resources of Nature and her mighty agencies, and what are all 
these worth ? Africa to-day has ten million square miles of soil as 
fertile as lies beneath the sun. She has a hundred millions of people. 
Yet the little island of England, with only about sixty thousand square 
miles and forty millions of people, produces annually, in a climate 
almost of the polar circle, more articles of food and clothing raised 
directly from the earth by agricultural labor alone, than all that conti- 
nent ; and if you "count in" the manufactures which her machinery 
yields, she does the work of ten times the whole population of Africa. 
How is she enabled to do this ? Simply because the educated mind of 
England can multiply her hands by a thousand-fold. Nature lends her 
gravitation — even enslaves her sun, and harnesses her lightning, so that 
they afford hands and feet to labor and run for those people who have 
learned how to use such agencies. The same thing is seen in any 
enlightened country, or at least where education is widely diffused. 
And yet in England less than half the common people's children are 
educated in any suitable degree. It is mind which has accomplished 
all these wonders ; and minds are found in almost equal numbers in all 
ranks of society. The child of the peasant is often as full of genius as 
the child of the prince, with a stronger body and less tendency to habits 
of vice or recklessness ; and if he can be found and educated, the nation 
certainly derives the greatest possible benefits ; and, if a nation is to be 
raised to its highest degree of efficiency, every particle of its mind must 
be utilized. 

The war between France and Germany affords pertinent illustration 
of the value of education in a peasantry to increase the worth of men, 
considered as mere machines of warfare. Every German soldier could 
read and write, and knew the geography of France. He could calcu- 
late almost as well as his officers, and he knew how to take care of his 
person and health. Those of France were nearly half illiterate, and as 
an army they seemed little more than a bank of snow before an April 
wind in comparison with the Germans. 

The nine millions of children who daily march to the school-houses 
of the North, the West, and the South, are better, as a defence for the 
whole nation, than a standing army as large as all the armies of Europe. 
The quarter of a million of school-teachers, who daily drill these chil- 
dren in the school-houses, are a better provision for training the nation 
in patriotism than all the statesmen and military officers of the Old 
World. Let every child of the Nation be sent to a good school, and 
trained by a proper method in broad national ideas, and we never need 
fear either foreign aggression and domination, or domestic insurrection 



302 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

and sectional strifes and jealousies. Strength, peace, harmony, pros- 
perity, nobility of character, patriotism, virtue and happiness, would 
flow as from a perennial spring in the mountains, to fill the land 
forever. 

But the benefits of education are not confined to an increase of ma- 
terial prosperity, and to the means of promoting the public defence. 
The physical comfort and general healthfulness of the whole popula- 
tion are advanced thereby in even a greater ratio than the interests 
before named. Can it be reckoned no benefit to a community that 
every person possesses sufficient intelligence to understand the reasons 
for cleanliness and exercise, the necessity for pure air and good food, 
and the means of securing all these ? Are more comfortable and 
beautiful homes no profit to families, and do not all arts which knowl- 
edge fosters contribute to the happiness and power of a people ? In 
the mere matter of bodily health it would not be difficult to show that 
if the whole of a community could be brought to practise the precepts 
of hygiene, which could be readily learned by a child of fourteen with- 
out loss of time for ordinary family duties or for needed rest, at least 
two-thirds of all the diseases which now afflict the human race would 
be as effectually banished from the earth as reptiles are from Ireland. 

The effect, also, of the general diffusion of education among the 
masses of our population in respect to their moral condition can 
scarcely be calculated. That evil will ever go side by side with good in 
this world, experience leaves us no reason to doubt. That while, by a 
general school system we are educating those who will be an honor to 
themselves and a benefit to society and the nation, we are also to a certain 
extent educating the vicious, is true ; but that, on the whole, education 
tends largely, very largely, to increase the better element in proportion 
to the vicious, is a fact that cannot be denied. To enter fully upon 
the discussion of this proposition would be out of place here, notwith- 
standing its great importance in this connection. But it is evident, to 
every intelligent person, that safety in this matter consists in continued 
progress. To halt in the race, will result in giving over society and the 
nation to the control of the vicious. To education, therefore, must we 
look for all the elements of national strength, and the more generally 
it is diffused and the higher its grade, in like proportion will our 
national power be increased. So that if Congress intends to do any- 
thing in this great work that will be adequate to the wants of the people, 
it must be done with a liberal hand, and in a manner that will show 
manifest justice to all sections. While ten or fifteen millions may, and 
will, do much good if granted to one section, those who are imposing 
heavy burdens upon themselves in other sections to educate their 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 303 

children will have just grounds to complain that injustice has been 
done them. 

While Illinois spends 1 per cent, of the assessed value of her tax- 
able property, and Iowa 1.4 per cent., for school purposes, Georgia 
spends but one-tenth of 1 per cent., and North Carolina but one-fourth 
of 1 per cent, for this purpose. This difference cannot, of course, be 
charged to inability, but, to put it in the mildest form, it must be 
charged to neglect, or the want of appreciation of the value of education. 
To help the latter, then, and withhold assistance from the former, 
would have too much the appearance of rewarding the negligent, who 
are unwilling even to do what they can to help themselves, and refus- 
ing aid to those who are burdening themselves to prepare their chil- 
dren to be useful members of society and valuable citizens of the 
Nation. I am as desirous as anyone in this Senate to assist those 
States that are in the background in this respect, for I am fully aware 
they are laboring under difficulties which do not apply to their sister 
States, and this is one great reason — in fact, I may say the chief reason 
— why I have brought forward this bill. But I wish the Government 
to be just in distributing its favors, and this cannot be done effectually 
in this matter with much less than the amount I have proposed. 
Although money from this tax has no more inherent value in it for this 
purpose than any other fund, yet there is something pleasing in the 
idea that the mighty stream of liquid sin, flowing on in spite of all the 
efforts made to check it, and bearing multitudes downward to its whirl- 
pool of crime and death, will thus be made, by its very downward press- 
ure, a power to lift as many more from the depths of ignorance ; that 
the very streams the distillers and retailers are sending forth to foster 
vice and crime may be used as a force to destroy their origin, just as the 
maddened waters of Niagara may be made a force to level the precipice 
from which they fall. So far, then, as the use of this particular fund 
in this way inspires this feeling in those who encourage education and 
temperance, so far, we may truly say, it would be more effectual than 
any other. 

Men called statesmen are apt to believe that they control the masses ; 
but when the masses, whether right or wrong, become aroused on any 
question pertaining to government, the men known as statesmen are 
as powerless to control them as they are to direct the storm ; and so the 
leading men, or statesmen, as they are called, join their respective sides 
and add fury to the desires of the people. Aristides did not control 
Athens, nor Xerxes, Persia, in that fullest sense -which brought the des- 
tinies of nations into conflict. The common Greeks and the common 
Persians, who had in some way learned in their ignorance to hate and 



504 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



despise each other, made those furious wars possible, if not necessary. 
So it will always be. The instincts, as we sometimes call them, — and these 
are scarcely anything but the transmitted notions and sentiments of one 
generation accumulating power in another, — will sway the populace, 
and influence the policy of rulers. They will, by their desires, force the 
government into unwise measures. If they are selfish, they will com- 
pel a selfish, and perhaps an aggressive, policy. If they are vicious, 
the government cannot long maintain a consistent course of justice and 
honor. If they are divided by sectional jealousies and trained to hos- 
tile feelings, can there be union of sentiment and action? 

In our own land, to-day, the grossly ignorant are numerous enough 
to control the affairs of the Nation. They hold the balance of power, 
if they could only unite. But while they do not unite as a class, their 
influence may do worse than form a union among themselves ; for any 
apparent attempt to form a party of the ignorant, would undoubtedly 
be met by a combination of the intelligent. Their wishes and desires, 
their prejudices and jealousies, may suggest to demagogues opportuni- 
ties to gain selfish ends, and plunge us into still greater sectional strifes. 
We need, as a Nation so extended, to foster homogeneous instruction in 
our hundred different climates and regions. The one grand thing to do 
in every one of these regions, each larger than most of the nations of the 
world, is to secure the uniformity of intelligence and virtue. We need 
no other. 

If our people in the pine woods of Maine or Michigan ; if those in the 
mines of the Carolinas and Virginia, in Colorado and Nevada, in Cali- 
fornia and Alaska ; if the cultivators of the farms in Ohio and Dakota, 
of the plantations of Georgia and Louisiana ; if the herders of the ranches 
of Texas and New Mexico, — can all be rendered intelligent enough to see 
the excellence of virtue, and be made noble enough to practise its self- 
restraining laws ; if they can be taught wisdom enough to appreciate the 
ten thousand advantages of a national Union embracing a hundred cli- 
mates and capable of sustaining a myriad of mutually helpful industries, 
freely interchanging their products and acting on one another, as mutual 
forces, to stimulate every one to its highest capacity of rival endeavor, 
— then we would be sure of a stable Union, and an immortality of glory. 

Is it not, now, easy to see that the education of the young, on one 
common plan, with one common purpose, — the people's children 
taught by the people themselves, — in schools made by the people 
themselves, yet in some noble sense patronized by the Nation, and 
supervised by the Nation, in some proper manner, will aid in making 
on this continent a nation such as we hope to be, and what the fore- 
shadowings of Providence seem to indicate we ought to be, the one 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 305 

great and mighty Nation of the world ? We have the same glorious 
Constitution. Let us all, from highest to lowest, from richest to poor- 
est, from blackest to whitest, learn to read its words as they are written, 
and then we shall be most likely to interpret its provisions alike, and 
administer its enactments alike, in justice and honor. 

We all read the same Bible, and claim to practise the same golden 
rule. Let us instruct all the youth whom the beneficent Father gives 
us, natives of this land or born on other shores, in the grand principles 
of morality which it inculcates, and in all the science which it has fos- 
tered. We all inherit, from our mother-land, the same invaluable code 
of common laws and institutions. Let us, if need be, be careful all to 
obtain enough knowledge to read and understand the laws which the 
Legislatures of the several States shall make, and the decisions, in 
accordance with that common law, which their courts shall render. We 
have received from our ancestors, and from the present generation of 
philosophic scientists, a body of knowledge and wisdom, the worth of 
which even genius can scarcely estimate. Let that be given to every 
child that breathes our atmosphere, in substantially the same spelling- 
book and primer, in schools as good among the snows of Aroostook as 
in marts of New York, Boston, or Charleston ; as free on the shores of 
Puget Sound as on the prairies of Illinois, and as well taught in the 
rice-fields of the South as on the hills of Connecticut. Then we shall 
be "one and inseparable, now and forever." 

THE FITZ-JOHN PORTER CASE IN 1 884 — LOGAN AGAIN ASSAILS 
THE OBNOXIOUS BILL IN THE SENATE HE BIDS THE CON- 
FEDERATE DEMOCRATS BEWARE ! 

Again, on March 14, 1884, Senator Logan made a most 
powerful and convincing speech in the Senate upon a House 
bill to place Fitz-John Porter on the retired list of the army as 
a colonel, but without the back-pay feature which had been 
attached to previous attempted legislation in his behalf. 
Again, as before, every senator was in his seat during the 
hours in which he held their rapt attention, and again the gal- 
leries were crowded to suffocation — and it was difficult to 
restrain their plaudits. In concluding this speech General 
Logan eloquently said : 

If this act of wrong, as I deem it, shall be perpetrated by the Con- 
gress of the United States, it will be declaring that those who failed in 
20 



;o6 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

the hour of trial, are those who shall be honored in the hour of tri- 
umph ; it will be declaring to the world that the record of those in the 
army who failed at the important time, is as good as those who sus- 
tained the Government ; that the honor and glory of the whole army of 
the United States shall not be maintained alone by the honors it won, 
but shall be maintained by the honors lost by its unworthy members. 
When we returned to our homes and our peaceful pursuits, when the 
armies of a million of men melted away into the paths of peace, we then 
expected, and ought to expect now, that nothing would be done, by 
Congress, at least, that would mar the thought which should be in every 
man's mind, that equality and justice should be done to all according to 
the laws and Constitution of our land ; that justice should be done the 
living, and that justice also should be meted out to the reputation of the 
dead. 

So then, for the honor of this Nation, let not its representatives mar 
the record that loyalty made in behalf of this Government and for the 
benefit of this people. 

I have deemed it to be my duty as a member of this body to oppose 
at all times a proposition of this character, because I believe it to be 
wrong in theory, and certainly wrong in practice. I believe it will de- 
moralize the army, and have a demoralizing effect upon the country. 

I say, in all kindness, to the other side of this Chamber (it will per- 
haps have no effect), your course, assisted by a few of our side, in this 
case, will prevent the people of this country, as long as you shall pro- 
ceed in this way, from having confidence that you intend to administer 
the affairs of the Government fairly. The opening of the doors for 
Fitz-John Porter does not mean Fitz-John Porter. It means breaking 
down the barrier, the wall between the good and the bad, and those 
who failed in time of trial and those who did their duty. It means 
opening the door on the retired list to Porter, and to other men, 
who failed us in our trials, who shall follow in his wake. It means 
more. I do not care what a few gentlemen who were in the Union 
army, may say ; I do not care what a few gentlemen who were not in the 
Union army, may say ; but the great body of the American people do not 
believe in breaking down the barriers between the men who failed in 
time of need and the men who stood at their posts. 

When I say that, I am speaking of our loyal people. I mean that 
the people do not believe in your coming here to regulate courts-mar- 
tial for us during the war. They do not believe it just ; they do not be- 
lieve it is right. I am speaking in truth to you, and the people will 
emphasize it to you hereafter. Let your Confederacy regulate its own 
courts-martial while it existed in opposition to this Union, but do not 



LOGAN AFTER THE WAR. 307 

come here from under that flag with numbers sufficient to put disgraced 
men back in the army, to cast slurs upon our men who did their duty, to 
trample in the dust the authority that suppressed your Confederacy. 
Let not your feelings go that far. If they do, I tell you that more years 
than you think will pass over your heads before you will have the con- 
fidence of the American people. 

There are some friends on this side of the Chamber who join with the 
other side. They are entitled to their views. I say to them, you will 
open the doors to danger in this country, when you do this act. It is 
not an act of kindness to this man ; it is an act of injustice to the army ; 
it is an act of injustice to the loyal people of this country ; it is an 
act of injustice to the memory of Lincoln, and those who were asso- 
ciated with him at the time ; it is trampling underfoot, the law and the 
facts. You who were their friends in the hour of trial, you who stood 
by them then, should not falter now. You are to-day doing that which 
you would not have done ten years ago. But to-day the consciences of 
some people are getting so easy, that we must do everything that is 
asked, for men who failed us in the hour of greatest danger, for men 
who are entitled to nothing except what they received. We are asked 
in charity, which is no charity, to violate the law, to violate the proper 
rules of civil conduct, to violate the judgment of a court, to violate the 
order of a President made according to law and justice, as shown at that 
time and now. I hope, at least, that men who have stood by the coun- 
try in the hour of trial, will not weaken, in the hour of triumph, in the 
interests of those whose triumph would have proved disastrous to the 
country. 

The conscientious feeling that I have performed my duty, accord- 
ing to my honest convictions, to my country, to the honor of our now 
faithful little army, to my comrades in arms during the war, to the living 
and the dead that took part in the judgment of the court, to the loyal 
people that loved this country and helped to save it, shall be in my own 
breast, through life, my reward for my action in this case. 

SENATOR LOGAN ASSAILED AS A " LAND-GRABBER " HE DE- 
NOUNCES THE CHARGE AS " MALICIOUSLY FALSE," AND PROVES 

IT TO BE SO EVEN THE DEMOCRATIC SENATORS LAUGH THE 

CHARGE TO SCORN. 

On July 4, 1884 — just twenty-one years after that other 
Fourth of July when he had led the victorious hosts of the 
Union into the fortress of Vicksburg, — General Logan, who 



^o8 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

had been again slanderously assailed by his Democratic ene- 
mies, this time as a "land-grabber," deemed it necessary to 
meet and repel the base attack on the floor of the United 
States Senate. The published charge or insinuation was that 
Logan, " who from his manner and appearance rumor says 
has their blood in his veins, tried to steal from his own kith 
and kin hundreds of thousands of acres of land — taken from 
the unfortunate savage, who was unable to protect himself 
until an honest Secretary of the Interior went there with 
the Surveyor, and took back the land for the Zunis " — the 
reading of which was received with scornful " laughter and 
applause on the Democratic side." After declaring this 
charge to be "maliciously false," Logan proceeded to place 
upon record, written statements from Commissioner McFar- 
land of the General Land Office, Major Tucker, U.S.A., 
Captain Lawton, U.S.A., Colonel James Stevenson of the 
United States Geological Survey, and Secretary Teller of the 
Interior Department, which conclusively proved it to be so, 
and that the whole story was based upon the single attenuated 
fact that Major Tucker, Captain Lawton, and Mr. Stout, ex- 
ercising their own undoubted rights as citizens, had located 
desert-land claims on public lands, open to entry by anybody, 
at Nutria Spings, N. M., some twenty-five or thirty miles 
from the town of Zuni, and outside of the Zuni reservation, — 
a location, moreover, in which Logan had not the slightest 
pecuniary interest. But Major Tucker being Logan's son-in- 
law, the attempt had thus been made to assail the latter 
through the former. Logan ended by saying "This, sir, is 
a full answer to this false, unprovoked, and malicious slander, 
which I place on record, where all may have access to it." 
And so full and complete was this speech of self-vindication, 
that, during all the long and exciting and bitterly personal 
National campaign which closely followed it, neither this nor 
any other insinuation was breathed against the personal char- 
acter of Logan. 



PART IV. 



LOGAN ON THE PRESIDENTIAL TICKET. 

GENERAL LOGAN AGAIN TALKED OF FOR THE PRESIDENCY 

A TRAIN OF LOGAN MEN REACHES CHICAGO HIS NAME BEFORE 

THE CHICAGO CONVENTION OF 1 884. 

For some time prior to the meeting of the Republican 
National Convention at Chicago, June 3, 1884, the name of 
General Logan, as that of an available Republican candidate 
for the Presidency, had frequently been discussed in the 
press, and among leading men of that party, with evident 
favor. It was argued that his candidacy would secure the 
support of the great body of the Methodist Church, of which 
he was a member ; of that strong element represented by 
the Union soldiers and their relations and friends; of the 
colored people, whose steadfast friend he had ever been from 
the period of their emancipation ; and of that still more 
numerous factor in American politics known as the laboring 
element, for whose education, welfare, and prosperity he had 
so earnestly, persistently, and faithfully labored. With his 
grand record in the army, at the hustings, and in the legis- 
lative halls of the Nation, his friends thought such a candi- 
date at the head of the Republican ticket would sweep the 
States triumphantly. In the course of an article headed 
" General John A. Logan," the Grand Army Record as far 
back as October 15, 1882, had said: 

Next to General Grant, no man in the Republic has a stronger 
hold on the affections of the masses than he who heads this article. 



3io 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



Plain, affable, guileless, honest, John A. Logan is one of Nature's 
noblemen. Whether in the field, at the head of his invincible army- 
corps, or as a Senator of the United States, he has always proven himself 
equal to any emergency, and has always merited and received the 
plaudits of his coilntrymen. ... 

But it is as a statesman that General Logan has won a name even 
greater than the proud distinction he acquired as a field-marshal. 
What an exemplar for the youth of the Republic! Surrounded 
by opportunities for amassing millions, John A. Logan is to-day a 
poor man. While others have made themselves rich, on salaries of 
$5,000 per annum, he has amassed nothing but imperishable renown, 
and is doubtless a poorer man than he was in i860. For this reason 
he is entitled to the highest commendation, and good men everywhere 
delight to know such a man. 

Should he be made the standard-bearer of his party, he would re- 
ceive the earnest, hearty, and successful support of the vast majority 
of his countrymen, who would thus delight to honor the noblest work 
of God, an honest man. 

Numberless other papers bore testimony to a pretty- 
widespread feeling in favor of his candidacy. But General 
Logan, although saying and doing nothing to discourage his 
friends from urging his candidacy, persistently declined, from 
the very first moment, to say or do anything in this direction 
that might possibly be construed even by his enemies as self- 
seeking. He held, with another, that the Presidential office 
is that one of all offices in the people's gift that should seek 
the man, and not the man the office. The Illinois delegation 
to the Republican National Convention of 1884, determined, 
however, to present the General's name as the candidate of 
his native State. That their candidate was popular, they had 
assurances from delegates of many other States ; and the 
arrival of " a train of Logan men " at Chicago June 2, 1884, 
as told in the following words by the Evening ^Journal, only 
confirmed their impression of the enthusiasm which his nom- 
ination for that position would evoke throughout the country : 

A special train arrived here at eight o'clock this morning from 
Washington, D.C., over the Pennsylvania Road, via Baltimore, hand- 



LOGAN ON THE PRESIDENTIAL TICKET. 3II 

somely decorated, and the following mottoes on the cars : " Boys, 
McPherson and Revenge." There was a life-like portrait of General 
Logan, on each side of which were the words, "Our Choice." Then 
followed "With Logan is Victory." These were all in large and con- 
spicuous characters, that they might be seen from a distance. The train 
consisted of fourteen cars in two sections, and on its arrival at Baltimore 
was met by a large delegation from that city, headed by Hon. A. Worth 
Sparks, Captain Frank Duhorst, and Colonel William Leonard. This 
train was arranged for in Washington by Dr. E. A. Adams, a prominent 
Loganite, and in its transit to Chicago was greeted at every point 
with an ovation. At points where the train stopped such expressions 
as the following were heard: "Logan would be hard to beat." " He 
would divide the Democratic soldier-vote." "I'm a Democrat, but put 
up Logan and I will vote for him." " He is the only man that ever 
sought the nomination whose record is immaculate." 

On board the train were friends of Logan from Virginia, North and 
South Carolina, and it is evident that if General Logan is not nomi- 
nated, it will not be the fault of his friends from Maryland and the 
District of Columbia. 



LOGAN S NAME PRESENTED TO THE REPUBLICAN NATIONAL CON- 
VENTION OF 1884 AS THE CANDIDATE OF ILLINOIS HOW IT 

WAS RECEIVED. 

On Tuesday, June 3, 1884, the Republican National Con- 
vention met at Chicago, and was temporarily organized. On 
Wednesday, June 4th, it was permanently organized. When 
General J. B. Henderson, of Missouri, was chosen Permanent 
Chairman he made a speech, in which he referred to all the 
candidates. His reference to General Logan — " Illinois can 
come with one who never failed in the discharge of public 
duty, whether in council-chamber or on field of battle," — was 
loudly cheered. So also was his reference to Mr. Blaine 
when he said " Maine has her honored favorite, whose 
splendid abilities and personal qualities have endeared him to 
the hearts of his friends, and the brilliancy of whose genius 
challenges the admiration of all." On the evening of Thurs- 
day, June 5th, nominations of candidates for the Presidency 



3 I2 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

being in order, after Connecticut had presented Senator 
Hawley's name, the Washington National Tribune says : 

The next State that responded was Illinois, and as Senator Cullom 
mounted the platform to present the name of General John A. Logan, 
cheer after cheer followed him. When he was at last allowed to pro- 
ceed, he began by referring to the nominations of Lincoln and Grant, 
both from Illinois, and both first nominated in Chicago. In 1880, the 
party assembled again in Chicago, had organized success by nominating 
Garfield, and now, in 1884, in the same State, Illinois, which had never 
wavered in its adherence to the Republican Party, presents, as the 
standard-bearer of that party, another son, one whose name would be 
recognized from one end of the land to the other as an able statesman, 
a brilliant soldier, and an honest man — John A. Logan. 

The announcement of General Logan's name was received with a 
wild burst of applause, a great many persons rising to their feet, waving 
their hats and handkerchiefs, and the thousands of people in the gallery 
joining in the roars of applause. The cheers were renewed again and 
again. The speaker resumed : 

"A native of the State which he represents in the council of the 
Nation, reared among the youth of a section where every element of 
manhood is early brought into play, he is eminently a man of the peo- 
ple. [Applause.] The safety, the permanency, and the prosperity of 
the Nation depend upon the courage, the integrity, and the loyalty of 
its citizens. When yonder starry flag was assailed by enemies in arms, 
when the integrity of the Union was imperiled by an organized treason, 
when the storm of war threatened the very life of the Nation, this gal- 
lant son of the Prairie State resigned his seat in the Congress of the 
United States, returned to his home, and was the first of our citizens to 
raise a regiment and to march to the front in defence of his country. 
[Applause.] Like Douglas, he believed that in time of war men must 
be either patriots or traitors, and he threw his mighty influence on the 
side of the Union, and Illinois made a record second to none in the his- 
tory of States in the struggle to preserve this Government. [Applause.] 
Mis history is the record of the battles of Belmont, of Donelson, of Shi- 
loh, of Vicksburg, of Lookout Mountain, of Atlanta, and of the famous 
march to the sea. [Great applause.] I repeat again, Mr. Chairman 
and fellow-citizens, he never lost a battle in all the war. [Applause.] 
When there was fighting to be done he did not wait for orders, nor did 
he fail to obey orders when they were received. His plume — the white 
plume of Henry of Navarre — was always to be seen at the point where 
the battle raged the hottest. [Applause.] During the long struggle of 



LOGAN ON THE PRESIDENTIAL TICKET. * 1X 

four years, he commanded, under the authority of the Government, first 
a regiment, then a brigade, then a division, then an army corps, and 
finally an army. He remained in the service until the war closed, when, 
at the head of his army, with the scars of battle upon him, he marched 
into the capital of the Nation, and with the brave men whom he had led 
on a hundred hard-fought fields was mustered out of the service under 
the very shadow of the Capitol building which he had left four years 
before as a member of Congress, to go and fight the battles of his coun- 
try. When the war was over, and genial peace victoriously returned, 
lie was again invited by his fellow-citizens to take his place in the coun- 
cils of the Nation. In a service of twenty years in both Houses of Con- 
gress, he has shown himself to be no less able and distinguished as a 
citizen than he was renowned as a soldier. Conservative in the advo- 
cacy of measures involving the public welfare, ready and eloquent in 
debate, fearless — yes, I repeat again, fearless — in defence of the rights 
of the weak against the oppressions of the strong, he stands to-day 
closer to the great mass of the people of this country than almost any 
other man now engaging public attention. [Applause.] No man has 
done more in defence of those principles which have given life and spirit 
and victory to the Republican Party than has John A. Logan of Illinois. 
[Applause.] In all that goes to make up a brilliant military and civil 
career and to commend a man to the favor of the people, he whose 
name we have presented here to-night has shown himself to be the peer 
of the best. 

General Prentiss seconded the nomination of General Logan in a 
brief but telling speech, and the roll-call was then resumed. 

The remarkable scenes and proceedings of that memorable 
Convention are still fresh in the minds of all. Hence it is not 
the purpose of the writer to allude to them except in so far 
as they have a direct bearing on the illustrious subject of this 
narrative. 

THE FOUR BALLOTS HOW LOGAN SECURED THE NOMINATION OF 

BLAINE, AND WHY HE DID IT HIS FAMOUS DESPATCH. 

It will doubtless be remembered that it required four bal- 
lots to absolutely decide the contest for the Presidential nomi- 
nation. Upon the first ballot the vote for the four leading 
candidates stood: Blaine, 334^; Arthur, 278; Edmunds, 93; 
Logan, 63%. Upon the second : Blaine, 349; Arthur, 276; 



3 I4 LIFE OF IOGAN. 

Edmunds, 85; Logan, 61. Upon the third: Blaine, 375; 
Arthur, 274; Edmunds, 69 ; Logan, 61. 

During the balloting, General Logan, with his wife and 
two or three friends — the writer among them — was in the 
upper rooms of his (Twelfth Street) Washington residence, 
receiving despatches direct from the Convention-hall. Before 
the third ballot was concluded, the General, sitting on the 
edge of a couch, wrote in pencil the famous despatch which 
decided the contest. It was in these words : 

Washington, D. C, June 6, 1884. 

To Senator Cullom, Convention Hall, Chicago, III. : 

The Republicans of the States that must be relied upon to elect the 

President having shown a preference for Mr. Blaine, I deem it my duty 

not to stand in the way of the people's choice, and recommend my 

friends to assist in his nomination. 

John A. Logan. 

The despatches to the Washington Post said : 

The result of the third ballot had hardly been announced when, like 
a flash of lightning, the report went over the floor that Logan had tele- 
graphed his supporters to go for Blaine. When the news reached the 
Arthur managers it was received with incredulity, but a moment later a 
copy of the telegram, addressed to Senator Cullom and signed by John 
A. Loo-an, was before their eyes. This made the result of the ensuing 
ballot a foregone conclusion, especially when the news was followed 
by the announcement that the Ohio delegation would go solid the same 
way. 

The contents of General Logan's despatch, as has been 
stated, being known all over the Convention in less time than 
it takes to write the fact, an attempt was made to defeat "the 
people's choice " by a motion to take a recess until the even- 
ing, in the hope that it would carry, and that time would thus 
be gained for concentrating the opposition to Mr. Blaine upon 
some other candidate, but it was too late. Logan's telegram 
had already effected its purpose, and the subsequent proceed- 
ings, including the fourth ballot, necessarily followed, and were 
* 



LOGAN ON THE PRESIDENTIAL TICKET. 315 

mere matters of form. What ensued is thus told in the des- 
patches of the Post : 

When Illinois was called, the chairman of the delegation, Senator S. 
M. Cullom, said : " I ask leave of this Convention to read a despatch 
which I have received a few moments ago from General John A. Logan, 
addressed to the Illinois delegation." (Loud cries of "Regular order, 
regular order," " I object," "Call the roll," and great confusion.) 

Mr. Cullom—" To the Republicans "— ( Loud cries of " Order," " Call 
the roll," " Regular order.") 

" I am directed by General Logan to read it to this Convention, and 
shall send the despatch to the desk to be read." ( Loud cries of " No, 
no," and great confusion.) 

Mr. Burrows of Michigan — " I make the point of order that the read- 
ing of the despatch is not in order, and nothing but the announcement 
of the vote is in order." (Loud applause.) 

"The chair sustains the point of order." ( Loud applause.) 

Mr. Cullom—" The Illinois delegation then withdraws the name of 
General John A. Logan, and gives for Blaine thirty-four votes, for Lo- 
gan seven, and for Arthur three." (Loud applause and loud cheers.) 

This clinched the business, the fourth ballot standing, for 
the four candidates mentioned: Blaine, 541; Arthur, 207; 
Edmunds, 41 ; Logan, 7 — the nomination of Mr. Blaine be- 
ing- then made unanimous. The account in the Post said : 

The secretary's announcement of the votes for James G. Blaine got 
no further than the hundreds, for his voice was lost in a whirlwind of 
applause that followed the announcement of Blaine's nomination, which 
had been a'certainty ever since Shelby M. Cullom had tried to read his 
telegram from John A. Logan. 

Every person in the audience, delegates and visitors alike, rose to 
their feet simultaneously, and, all being Blaine men now, shouted and 
sang their delight to the success of the man from Maine, with demon- 
strations of joy such as had not been seen before in the Convention. 
It took nearly thirty minutes to get to business. 

The moment that it was absolutely certain that Mr. Blaine 
would get the nomination, General Logan wrote and sent to 
Mr. Blaine, then at Augusta, the despatch of congratulation 
hereafter given. 



316 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



From this prompt and decisive action of General Logan 
at exactly the right time the political reader will get an idea 
of some of the qualities which made him so successful as a lead- 
er in war. When he wrote the despatch there was no hesitancy 
about it; after he sent it, no regret. On the contrary he de- 
clared that it was a matter of conscience with him, and was 
the right and only thing to do. Many another politician in his 
position would have written no such despatch ; would have 
favored an adjournment, and depended upon his excellent 
chances for making combinations and securing the great prize 
to himself. But here again, as in the case of General Thomas 
at Nashville, — heretofore referred to, — he triumphed over self, 
and secured victory to the man whom he thought the people 
wanted to win it. And now that he is gone from them forever, 
the people, whom General Logan in so many fields of action 
served so conscientiously, so devotedly, so grandly, too late 
will learn to appreciate him in all the sincere, honest, manly 
beauty of his really lovable character. 

At that time, however, his enemies continued to lie about 
him and try to mislead. In fact no sooner was he nomin- 
ated for the Vice-Presidency than some envenomed tongue 
whispered that it was " a bargain with Blaine." The 
Aurora Beacon of July 2, 1884, thus refuted the mean cal- 
umny : 

It is claimed by many enemies of Logan, and by the Democratic 
partisans, that it was an agreed matter that Logan should be the Repub- 
lican nominee for Vice-President in case Blaine took the Presidency. 
That this was not so, is proven by the facts in the case. On the eve of 
the Vice-Presidential nomination various members of the Convention 
desired A. M. Jones, who was recognized as Mr. Logan's next friend, to 
ask Logan to accept the Vice-Presidency. This, Mr. Jones refused to 
do. Later, Governor Long, of Massachusetts, urged this upon Mr. 
Jones again, stating that there were twenty-eight States which would 
give solid delegations for Logan as Vice-President, and urging him to 
advise Logan to accept the position. Again he refused, but did tele- 
graph to Logan the position, adding, "What shall we do ?" To this, 
Logan sent the following answer : 



LOGAN ON THE PRESIDENTIAL TICKET. 317 

"Washington, D. C , June 6, 7.30 p.m. 
"A. M.Jones, Grand Pacific, Chicago: 

" The Convention must do what they think best under the circum- 
stances. 

"John A. Logan." 

And that is the history of the connection of Logan with the nomina- 
tion for the Vice-Presidency. It came to him, not from any preparation, 
but from combinations of circumstances which compelled the Conven- 
tion to the course it took, and it was a very proper and acceptable 
course. 

The writer can add, of his own knowledge, that besides 
the despatch from Mr. Jones, here alluded to, General Logan 
received a number of others from gentlemen of distinction at 
Chicago immediately after the nomination of Mr. Blaine, and 
whom it was fair to presume could control the choice of the 
Convention for the Vice-Presidency, offering him that nomi- 
nation and urging him to state whether he would accept if 
nominated — to none of which did the General consider it 
proper to reply. Further than that, the same evening, several 
gentlemen of national distinction called upon him to beg him 
to accept the nomination for the second place, to all of whom 
he listened in his usual gentle and kindly manner, but gave 
no indication as to his probable course. The fact is, that he 
did not want the Vice-Presidential nomination, but was after- 
ward reconciled to it by the remarkable unanimity with which 
it came to him, and his sense of duty to party and country. 

HOW GENERAL LOGAN WAS NOMINATED FOR THE VICE-PRESI- 
DENCY ON ROLL-CALL HE GETS 779 VOTES THE NOMINA- 
TION MADE UNANIMOUS BY ACCLAMATION. 

The manner in which General Logan was nominated by 
the Convention, at its evening session of the 6th, for Vice- 
President of the United States, must have been very pleasing 
to him. The story is very fairly told in the Washington Post 
(Democratic) despatches of that date, as follows : 

The resolution, limiting speeches of nomination to ten minutes, 
passed, and the clerk proceeded to call the roll of States for nominations. 



<, T g LIFE OF LOGAN. 

No response was made until Illinois was reached, when Senator Plumb 
of Kansas came forward. He said the Convention had completed two 
of its most serious duties — the adoption of a platform, and the nomina- 
tion of a candidate for President. The platform was one on which all 
good Republicans could unite, and the candidate was one who could 
beat any Democrat, living or'dead. But it was still important that the 
best possible man should be named for the second place. It was but a 
matter of just recognition to the great body of soldiers of the War for 
the Union that a representative of their number should be placed as the 
second name on the ticket. The Grand Army of the Republic had en- 
rolled more than three-quarters of a million men who lately wore the 
blue. In presenting a name from their ranks the speaker would men- 
tion a man fitted in every way for the first place ; a man who would add 
strength to the ticket and justify the hopes and expectations of the 
party. That man was General John A. Logan. [Loud, long, and re- 
newed applause.] The speaker did not present him on behalf of Illinois, 
or of any other State, but of the whole United States. He belonged no 
more to Illinois than to Kansas, where 75,000 soldiers would receive the 
news of his nomination with shouts of gladness. The speaker was 
commissioned by the State of Kansas to make this nomination. [Ap- 
plause.] 

Judge Houk of Tennessee, in seconding the nomination, said that 
while the Convention had not chosen his first choice, it had done well, 
and the speaker proceeded to pay a tribute to the Plumed Knight of 
Maine. He hoped the Convention would come to a common under- 
standing and agreement for the second place on the ticket. When the 
wires should transmit the news of the nomination of General Logan to 
the soldier boys of East Tennessee there would be rejoicing among 
them, as there would be everywhere. On the Presidential nominee his 
delegation was somewhat divided, but when they came to name John 
A. Logan they were united twenty-four strong. 

Mr. Thurston of Nebraska also seconded the nomination. He wanted 
the Republican Party to write upon its banner the invincible legend, 
"Blaine and Logan." [Applause, and cries of "Time, time."] 

After a few other speeches, Mr. Robinson of Ohio moved to sus- 
pend the rules and nominate Logan by acclamation. The motion was 
carried, both the ayes and nays being very weak. 

Mr. McKinley of Ohio moved the appointment of a committee to ap- 
prise the candidates of their nomination. 

Congressman Davis of Illinois moved that the roll be called on 
Logan's nomination, and it was called accordingly. The idea of a roll- 
call met the approval of the galleries, and each chairman, as he an- 



LOGAN ON THE PRESIDENTIAL TICKET. 319 

nounced the vote of his delegation, was cheered as heartily as though 
an exciting contest was in progress. 

Wisconsin voted nine for Logan and three for Lucius Fairchild, the 
latter being received with prolonged hissing. Massachusetts only cast 
twelve votes, and G. W. Curtis, on behalf of New York, asked time to 
make the count. The Wisconsin delegation withdrew their votes for 
Fairchild and gave twelve for Logan. New York being called a second 
time, Curtis responded with sixty for Logan, six for Gresham, and one 
for Foraker. Total number of votes polled for Logan, 779. 

The nomination was made unanimous this time, amid great ap- 
plause. 

When quiet was restored, a motion to adjourn sine die was put and 
carried, and the vast audience began to disperse. 

news of logan's nomination received in Washington — an 

impromptu ovation logan's congratulations to blaine 

— blaine's reply — blaine's ovation in augusta — his 
happy reference to logan. 

No sooner was the news of Logan's nomination for the 
Vice-Presidency known in Washington than the crowds 
around the bulletin-boards cheered themselves hoarse for 
the grand ticket. All seemed to feel that now the one thing 
needful to insure success had been done, and " It's a double- 
barrelled-ticket," and " It's a double-ender," and similar ex- 
pressions, were heard on every tongue. The old-soldier ele- 
ment was especially delighted, since they could not have 
Logan at the head, to have him second on the ticket. The 
news spread through the city like a flash. The Washington 
Post (Democratic), of July 7th, tells what spontaneously fol- 
lowed, in these words: 

At ten o'clock last night General Logan sat in his library, an inner 
second-floor room, at No. 812 Twelfth Street, conversing with a friend 
upon the events of the day's session of the Convention at Chicago. 
All the doors and windows were open to catch the evening breeze, and 
the lights were turned low except at a desk in one corner, where the 
General's secretary sat writing. In the adjoining front room Mrs. 
Logan was conversing with a party numbering eight or ten ladies and 
two or three gentlemen. The picture was that of an informal evening 



320 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

gathering of near acquaintances, and if there was any expectancy of an 
impending event it was successfully concealed by all the actors in the 
pleasant scene. 

A card was brought in to the General by a colored waiter, followed 
on the instant by two or three perspiring gentlemen, who seized Gen- 
eral Logan's hand and shook it heartily, offering him congratulations 
upon something which they were not given the opportunity to fully 
explain. There was a momentary sound of more excited conversation 
in the front room as if something of an agreeable nature had become 
known to the companion of Mrs. Logan, and that lady entered the 
library bearing a torn envelope and its enclosure in her hand. " Come, 
papa, here is something," she said, as she grasped his hand to lead him 
toward the light. A shout of three or four hoarse voices made itself 
heard from the street. A charming lady clad in pure white passed Mrs. 
Logan and seized both the General's hands, beginning an impressive and 
evidently a very welcome greeting. More gentlemen entered. Louder 
shouts came up from the street. Somebody proposed three cheers for 
something, and the result drowned for a moment all voices in the room. 
A sound of drums approaching from a distance lent its help to swell 
the noise. 

The General's face at the first salutation wore a look of something 
resembling surprise, but it gave place to blushes and broad smiles, as 
he was seized by ladies and gentlemen and conducted to the front 
window in response to the din of demand from the crowded street 
below. " Speech ! speech ! " shouted a crowd of a thousand white and 
colored men, in about equal portions ; and again the General, now a 
prisoner in the hands of his agreeable captors, took up his march. Way 
was cleared with difficulty through the hall, down the stairs, and out to 
the front door, where, standing upon the steps of the mansion, the 
General was cheered vociferously by his visitors. 

Silence was secured, and General Logan, in a voice inaudible to more 
than half the crowd, said, " Friends, I thank you for your cordial 
greeting to-night. I am not prepared to make a speech. Again I 
thank you. Good-night." 

The General and Mrs. Logan were conducted back to the parlor of 
the mansion, and then, the doors being thrown open, the crowds pressed 
in. Forming in line they decorously filed past, shaking the extended 
hands of both the General and his wife. In half an hour they were 
gone, and General Logan had an opportunity to read the paper which 
Mrs. Logan had brought him as the scene began. It proved to be an 
Associated Press bulletin announcing his nomination by acclamation 
for the Vice-Presidency. 



LOGAN ON THE PRESIDENTIAL TICKET. 



321 



In reply to the query of the Post reporter as to his acceptance, 

Senator Logan said : 

"I suppose it is my duty to accept, and I shall do so." 

"What do you think of Mr. Blaine's nomination?" 

" I think it is a very strong one. I have sent him the following 

telegram : 

"'Washington, D. C, June 6, 1884. 

"' Ho ft. James G. Blaine, Augusta, Me.: 

" * I most heartily congratulate you on your nomination. You will 

be elected. Your friend, 

" ' John A. Logan.'" 

To Senator Logan's telegram of congratulation Mr. Blaine sent the 
following reply : 

" I am proud and honored in being associated with you in the 
National campaign. 

" James G. Blaine." 

During the same evening- Mr. Blaine was the recipient at 
Augusta of a very flattering ovation — thus described in a 
despatch to the same Democratic journal : 

A special train of fifteen cars from Portland, Lewiston, and other 
cities reached this city this evening, and a few minutes later a special 
Bangor train arrived with thirteen cars and upward of a thousand per- 
sons. The visitors marched to the residence of Mr. Blaine, who received 
them and addressed them as follows : 

"Gentlemen : I am sure I must regard this as a compliment totally 
unprecedented in the history of politics in Maine. I do not dare take 
the compliment at all to myself, but I recognize the earnestness with 
which you are prepared to enter the pending National campaign ; and 
I have the pleasure to announce to you, from a despatch I have just 
received, that I have myself the honor to be associated on the Repub- 
lican ticket with that brave and honorable soldier, that eminent Senator 
and true man, John A. Logan, of Illinois. [Tremendous applause and 
cheers, three times three, for Logan. A voice, "You can't beat that 
team."] 

" I am sure, gentlemen, I am very sorry that the elements are not 
as auspicious as they might have been for your visit [A voice, ' We 
have been waiting for the shower eight years,'] and the way you stand 
it is a good proof. I am sure that you are wet. I can add nothing by 
a speech to that fact, and you would hardly expect me to do more on 
21 



322 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

this occasion than to express to you the very deep obligations I feel for 
the extraordinary compliment you have paid me in coming from your 
homes in distant parts of the State on the announcement of the action 
of the National Convention. I wish my home was large enough to 
contain you all, as my heart is." [Cries of "Good ! " and cheers.] 

HOW THE PRESS AND PEOPLE THROUGHOUT THE COUNTRY 
HAILED THE NOMINATION OF LOGAN. 

The spontaneous delight with which the news of the 
unanimous nomination of General Logan to the second 
place on the Presidential ticket was hailed by the Republi- 
can press of the whole country was as remarkable in its way 
as was the manner of the nomination itself. A very few 
only — and these in the briefest possible limits — can be given 
here, but they will serve to indicate the general enthusiasm 
with which that event was regarded by the press, as well as 
by the people to whom the General had devoted his life's 
best services : 

His name affords a sufficient guarantee that should the Republican 
Party be successful at the coming election, its pledge to the soldier 
will be faithfully carried out. — Washington National Tribune, June 12, 
1884. 

General Logan is abundantly qualified in character, resources, and 
experience to discharge the duties of President. Should the office 
accidentally fall to him, he will second the work so auspiciously begun 
by General Arthur, of removing the stigma that three successive 
failures had fastened upon the position and the name of " accidental 
President." — Kingston Daily Freeman. 

The nomination of John A. Logan for Vice-President, with James 
G. Blaine as the candidate for President, has made the Republican 
ticket of this year one of the strongest the party has ever presented. 
The selection has given the second place the dignity and importance 
with which it was regarded in the early days of the Republic. . . . 
General Logan will bring a tremendous personal strength to the cam- 
paign. — Tribune, June 7, 1884. 

The two great men represent the best elements of the American 
statesman and the American soldier. Logan would adorn either place. 
— Cleveland, O., leader. 

He is the equal of the head of the ticket in all the attributes of 



LOGAN ON THE PRESIDENTIAL TICKET. 



zn 



greatness and well-bestowed services that endear a public man to 
the people, and which beget their abiding confidence. — Kansas City 
journal. 

General John A. Logan is a typical Western man. He is a national 
character as well ; and though Illinois is honored with his residence, he 
belongs to the whole country. — Kansas City Journal. 

He was the choice of General Grant for the first place on the ticket, 
and of many others of that division of the party. . . . General 
Logan is a bluff, hearty, generous, outspoken, and honorable man, of 
great force of character and much ability. He has no narrow preju- 
dices, and does not make enemies. — Buffalo Express. 

His selection gives the proper geographical balance to the ticket 
and will appeal strongly to Western men, who have in Senator 
Logan a man of their own type, and to war veterans who know him as 
a staunch friend of the soldiers. — Boston Journal. 

John A. Logan is the peer of any man in the Senate. He has great 
ability and long experience, and is well fitted to fill the highest place 
in the Nation. — Kansas City Journal. 

His life is almost the typical one of the successful American. — 
Davenport Gazette. 

The soldier element is abundantly and well represented on the ticket 
in the person of General Logan — the ablest and most illustrious of the 
volunteer officers who fought against the rebellion. — Minneapolis Trib- 
une. 

John A. Logan, the candidate for Vice-President, is a man fit to be 
President. . . . He is honest, strong, frank, and true ; a man of 
broad views, prompt action, and great power ; a wise counsellor and a 
strong fighter, whose name will add strength to the ticket and whose 
election will be a credit to the party. — Manchester Mirror. 

General Logan's career has been a brilliant one, alike in military 
and in civil life. . . . His name will revive the glorious memories 
of many a well-fought field, . . . and be a watchword of victory 
around the Republican camp-fires in the political conflict now impend- 
ing. — Ohio State Journal. 

Although he has been in public life for a long period he has a repu- 
tation for being honest and incorruptible. — Langhorne, Fa., Standard. 

General Logan has an unblemished record as a soldier and states- 
man. He was one of the bravest of the brave during the dark days of 
the rebellion, and his reputation as a stainless and incorruptible repre- 
sentative of the people in the Halls of Congress is world-wide. — Wash- 
ington Republican. 

As for General Logan, the soldiers love him, the Western people 



3 2 4 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



love him, the Eastern people either love or respect him, and none are 
against him, excepting, perhaps, Fitz-John Porter and the Democratic 
Party. — Denver Tribune. 

He is a man the American people can point to with pride. There is 
not a public man of prominence in either party to-day with a better 
record than General Logan. He adds strength to the ticket. — Philadel- 
phia Item. 

His political religion is that the country can never pay the debt it 
owes to those who saved it in its hour of need, and made a country 
grand enough to live for ; that is why he has to-day such a place in the 
affectionate regard of all his comrades. This feeling will find expres- 
sion at the polls next November in spite of party needs or affiliations. — 
Fargo Argus. 

No man has more nobly won the honors that the Chicago Conven- 
tion have conferred upon him. Now let the people honor themselves 
by ratifying the action of the Convention. — Sandusky Republican. 

But in nominating John A. Logan for Vice-President, the Conven- 
tion selected a man who almost matches the head in the grandeur of his 
intellect, his force of brain, and in popularity. General Logan is one 
of the heroes of the Republic, whose brilliant career on the field is 
equalled by his achievements in statesmanship. — Allentown, Fa., Chronicle 
and News. 

General Logan is probably the strongest man who could have been 
named for the Vice-Presidency. He is particularly popular in the West 
and with the colored voters of the South, for whose civil and political 
rights no man has more courageously contended. He will strengthen 
the ticket in the two Virginias, North Carolina, and Indiana, . . . 
and he will increase the Republican majorities in Illinois, Kansas, Wis- 
consin, and all the Northwestern States. — San Francisco Chronicle. 

The Convention did not go off in haste and nominate a small man 
for Vice-President. General John A. Logan stood in the front rank of 
candidates for the Presidency, and he is nominated on his own stand- 
ing, and not as any man's follower. — Cincinnati Commercial Gazette. 

The nomination of Senator John A. Logan for the Vice-Presidency 
unquestionably added strength to the ticket — a strength that probably 
no other nomination could have given it. He was one of the foremost 
men mentioned as the soldiers' candidate, and will, beyond question, poll 
the full vote of those who wore the blue. — Columbus Evening Dispatch. 

General John A. Logan, the gallant, brave, successful soldier ; the 
plain-spoken, clear-headed legislator, needs no words of commenda- 
tion. . . . He is worthy of any honor the party or the people can 
confer upon him. — Indianapolis Journal, June 7th. 



LOGAN ON THE PRESIDENTIAL TICKET 325 

Taking all things into consideration, — his peculiar characteristics, 
his magnetism, his honesty, and the strength he displayed as a Presi- 
dential candidate, — we know of no man whom the Convention could 
have better selected for the second place on the ticket with James G. 
Blaine. — Buffalo Commercial Advertiser. 

The nomination of General Logan for Vice-President will be hailed 
by Republicans everywhere, and by the soldier element in particular, as 
a proper and deserved recognition of a brave, honest, and likable man. 
His whole life, practically, has been spent in the public service, and he 
was never known to neglect a duty nor betray a trust. The Republican 
Party owes him a big debt of gratitude both for his military and his 
civic services. — St. Louis Globe-Democrat. 

Had he been the head himself it would in reality have been stronger 
than it is. — New York Times. 

He has been scarcely less prominent in public life than Mr. Blaine, 
and is worthy of the support of the Republican Party, and will create 
great enthusiasm among the soldier-citizens. — Hartford Evening Post. 

Logan the soldier and Logan the statesman, known and beloved by 
all, is a fit second to the great leader, Blaine. — Davetiport Gazette. 

In the war he was a brilliant soldier ; in peace, in the Senate of the 
United States, he has always been at the front, defending those prin- 
ciples for which he fought. His nomination, like Blaine's, was an in- 
spiration, and it will be enthusiastically received by the country. — 
Kokomo Gazette- Tribune. 

No man has so thoroughly the affections of the soldiers who wore 
the blue, as has General Logan. His stainless record, both military 
and civil, his long public services, entitle and fit him for the high posi- 
tion to which a grateful people will call him next fall. — Lafayette Jour- 
nal. 

His nomination will be especially pleasing to old soldiers and South- 
ern Republicans, while all over the North it will arouse a spirit of 
enthusiasm. The ticket is one of giants, and will sweep the country. — 
Frankfort Banner. 

John A. Logan is worthy himself to be President. He has distin- 
guished himself in war and peace in patriotic services for his country, 
and his nomination will add strength to the ticket. — Terre Haute 
Courier. 

As Senator Cullom remarked when he placed General Logan's name 
before the Convention, "No man has done more in defence of the prin- 
ciples which have given life and spirit and victory to the Republican 
Party." — Chattanooga Commercial. 

The nomination of General John A. Logan for Vice-President is the 



326 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



very strongest that could have been made, in view of all the circum- 
stances. — Vinelaml, N. J., News-Times. 

Logan's name will add great strength to the ticket, and his selection 
is an honor worthily bestowed upon a brave soldier, a broad-minded 
statesman, and a true-hearted man. — Des Moines Stale Register. 

Aside from these considerations, General Logan is eminently well 
qualified for the Vice-Presidency, and in case of the death or removal 
of the President would fill the higher position with dignity and ability. 
— Pittsburg Commercial Gazette. 

General John A. Logan, the most distinguished of our volunteer 
soldiers, is also a most thoroughly acceptable American ; patriotic, 
brave, capable, and as honest as he is bold. — Dayton Journal. 

A successful soldier in war, an able and trained statesman in civil 
life, he will be a good second for Mr. Blaine on the ticket. The con- 
junction of two such favorites is one which will give a presage of victory 
as the crowning glory of the campaign. — Troy Daily Times. 

In some respects he is more popular with the soldier element than is 
either of the trio of great military leaders (Grant, Sherman, and Sheri- 
dan) whose names are always spoken in one breath by the American 
people. . . . He is a broad, enlightened, and courageous statesman, 
worthy of any honor which the country might bestow. He is fitted to 
be President, if, in the providences of the future, he should be called to 
the place. — Chicago Evening Journal. 

If there is one name more than any other worthy to be associated 
with that of the Republican candidate for President, as representing the 
virile, patriotic impulses with which Republicanism is instinct, the name 
is that of John A. Logan. The Convention, which had nominated 
Blaine amid scenes of enthusiasm, made no mistake when, with one 
voice, it asked the great General of Union volunteers and the distin- 
guished Senator from Illinois, to stand with the illustrious statesman as 
joint representative of the purposes of the party. — Albany Evening Journal. 

The name of John A. Logan was a happy inspiration. The sugges- 
tion ran through the Convention like wildfire, and it will be received 
with equal enthusiasm throughout the Nation. . . . He is so strongly 
identified with all the great victories of arms and the equally great 
measures of reconstruction and rehabilitation ; he is so positive a char- 
acter, so forceful, so incorruptible in his personal and public character 
and services, that there can be and will be no disparagement when 
the candidate for Vice-President shall be put in comparison with the 
brilliant and aggressive statesman who heads the column. — Indianapolis 
Journal. 

There is nothing weak or vacillating about him ; robust in body and 



LOGAN ON THE PRESIDENTIAL TICKET 327 

mind, he is a typical American character, as is also the head of the 
ticket, and together they will arouse more enthusiasm than any ticket 
the party ever presented. — Columbus Republican. 

His public life is a record of patriotism that any man or any nation 
might be proud of. — Norfolk Times. 

John A. Logan as Vice-President strengthens to a wonderful extent 
the candidacy of Mr. Blaine. Give Logan the wreath of victory if it falls 
on that side. — Springfield New Era (Democratic). 

The St. Paul Pioneer Press is mistaken when it says that Logan's 
nomination is not strong outside of Illinois. It will find that he is the 
stronger of the two. He will march triumphantly through the popular 
vote at the ballot-box as he marched triumphantly with Sherman to the 
sea. — Chippewa, Wis., Herald. 

The addition of John A. Logan greatly strengthens the ticket. He 
is the idol of the soldiers, and his career in Congress has been able and 
honorable. Blaine and Logan make a strong combination. — Green- 
castle, Ind., Banner. 

General Logan's nomination was a rounding out and perfecting of 
the ticket that would not have been properly filled had he not accepted 
the place. . . . In a sturdy and manly manner he has stood by his 
comrades in the army, while his Republicanism is of such a broad and 
national character that he has been recognized for years as the friend of 
all sections of the country. ... Of the soldier-statesman, John A. 
Logan, it is sufficient to say that he was a terror to the enemies of his 
country in a time of peril, and a bulwark to its friends. . . . He 
was a friend of the oppressed, the defender of the Constitution, the 
idol of his comrades, the Black Prince of the century. — Dover, Del., 
State Sentinel. 

Democratic as well as Republican soldier-boys will vote the ticket 
that bears his name. — Ottumwa Courier. 

It is a cause for congratulation that the second place on the ticket 
is filled by a man who is strong in himself and very strong among the 
people — one who is fully competent to be at the head of the ticket, and 
whose nomination for President we should have hailed with joy. . . . 
Throughout the Mississippi Valley and the entire South, Logan is 
especially strong, and Blaine is peculiarly popular in other portions of 
the country. — Loudon County, Va., Telephone. 

With Blaine at the head, and Logan associated with him, the popu- 
lar chord has been struck and the greatest enthusiasm has been aroused. 
. . . Blaine and Logan will receive the vote of every Republican 
and Liberal in the State, and that will give them the vote of North 
Carolina. — Raleigh, N C, State Journal. 



328 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



REPUBLICANS AT WASHINGTON PREPARING TO RATIFY — THE 
ILLINOIS REPUBLICAN ASSOCIATION CALL UPON LOGAN AND 
PAY THEIR RESPECTS. 

On the evening of June 13th a meeting of Republicans 
representing all the States and Territories of the Union — 
including- the District of Columbia — was held at German 
Hall, Washington, D. C, to perfect arrangements for an open- 
air meeting in front of the City Hall, for the ratification of the 
nominations of Blaine and Logan, at which three resolutions 
were adopted, besides that touching the proposed ratification. 
The first spoke highly of President Arthur's administration. 
The second, of the great qualities of James G. Blaine, term- 
ing him " the typical American." The third characterized the 
nomination of John A. Logan as " a just tribute to the soldiers 
and sailors of the country." 

The same evening the Illinois Republican Association, 
one hundred and fifty strong, marched to General Logan's 
Washington residence to pay their respects to that illustrious 
man, and were cordially received by the General and his wife. 

The Washington Republican of June 14th, alluding to this 
pleasing visit, said : 

Mr. T. L. DeLand, President of the Association, in introducing the 
members, spoke for them in expressing their gratification at the selec- 
tion of a Vice-President made by the National Convention. He spoke 
of the responsibilities and duties which would fall upon both the nomi- 
nees ; referred to the military and civil history of the General as inter- 
woven with that of the Nation, and familiar to every child in the land, 
and said that his fame as a soldier and statesman would never be for- 
gotten. 

General Logan thanked the association for its expression of good- 
will, referred to his long and pleasant association with many of those 
present, in success and in adversity, and closed with these words : 

"To one and all of you, gentlemen, I desire to manifest my deep 
appreciation of the spirit which prompts your visit at this time, and to 
extend the hand of fellowship and of hearty greeting to my friends here 
assembled." 



LOGAN ON THE PRESIDENTIAL TICKET. 329 

LOGAN IN MAINE AN OVATION FROM PORTLAND TO AUGUSTA 

GRAND RECEPTION AT AUGUSTA HIS STIRRING SPEECH AT MR. 

BLAINE'S RESIDENCE. 

The following interesting- despatches from the same paper 
will give some slight idea of the enthusiasm excited in Maine 
by his appearance there on a short visit, at this time, to Mr. 
Blaine : 

Portland, Me., June 16th. — Senators John A. Logan and Eugene 
Hale passed through this city on the noon train, and were met at the 
depot by Collector Dow, Postmaster Barker, Judge Haskell, and others. 
No reception was given. By invitation Senators Logan and Hale occu- 
pied the directors' car. A grand reception will be given on the arrival 
of the train at Augusta. 

Augusta, Me., June 16th. — Hon. John A. Logan and Senator Eugene 
Hale arrived here at 3.15 p.m. by the fast express. They were cheered 
at all the stations along the line. They will remain with Mr. Blaine to- 
night, and to-morrow go to Ellsworth, returning to Washington on 
Wednesday. Mr. Blaine will be invited to accompany the party to 
Ellsworth. At the station here, on alighting from the train, the distin- 
guished party were received with rounds of cheers. They were driven 
to Mr. Blaine's residence. 

Mr. Blaine was in readiness at his house to give his associate on the 
ticket a hearty welcome. General Logan comes here at his suggestion, 
so that they may confer together on the work of the campaign, and 
principally on the letter of acceptance, before the committee, which is 
to convey the official information of their nomination, reaches here. 
This committee is expected here next Friday. Mr. Blaine's letter is all 
written, but may be slightly changed in its phraseology in one or two 
places before it is given out. It is understood that it will be of con- 
siderable length. General Logan's letter, it is thought, will be brief. 

At eight o'clock this evening a procession was formed, in which 
there were over one hundred veteran soldiers, and marched to Mr. 
Blaine's residence. The streets were thronged with people. General 
Connor, in a few eloquent remarks, introduced General Logan. The 
latter stepping forward to the porch of Mr. Blaine's mansion, spoke as 
follows : 

" Ladies, Gentlemen, and Comrades : I most fully appreciate this 
kind compliment to-night. I am truly glad to meet so many citizens of 



3 3 o LIFE OF IOGAN. 

Augusta. I must confess that I feel embarrassed in attempting to say 
anything, after listening to what has been said by General Connor. It 
is true that the soldiers of Maine, in the same great contest, stood side 
by side with those from all other parts of the country, and did their duty 
for the preservation of this great Nation. It was preserved by their 
energy, their patriotism, and prowess. Behind them stood loyal citizens 
of this grand Republic giving them their support and prayers, with their 
hearts full of hope for their success, and as liberty first found birth on 
the Atlantic slope, well may it there have found true hearts for its pres- 
ervation not only for this country, but of that liberty which God in- 
tended for all men. 

" Let that which followed as a result of the preservation not now be 
lost. This can only be done by keeping control of the institutions of 
this country in the hands of those who sought to maintain them. This 
people believes in the fundamental principles of republican government. 
The same rule also applies in their selection of agents for the adminis- 
tration of the Government. The voice of a great majority of the Re- 
publicans of this mighty Nation has chosen as the standard-bearer of 
that great party in the coming contest for the Presidency of the United 
States, your fellow-citizen James G. Blaine [applause], and you need 
have no fear as to the result of this contest. It will be a glorious vic- 
tory, full and complete. Illinois, in i860, gave to this country its first 
Republican President. Maine was then associated with Illinois. In 
1884, Maine will give as gallant a President to this Republic as has been 
elected by this people. 

" Citizens of Maine, I feel honored and complimented by being as- 
sociated on the ticket with a man worthy of the confidence of the people, 
and in every way capable of filling the high office of President with 
honor to himself and to the country." [Tremendous applause, and 
cheers for Logan.] 

Senator Hale was called for, and responded briefly. At the close of 
his remarks loud calls were made for Mr. Blaine, who appeared at the 
door and gave a cordial invitation to all present, or as many as could do 
so, to enter his house, and take Mr. Logan by the hand. The reception 
lasted until a late hour. 

To-morrow being memorial day at the Soldiers' Homo at Togus, 
General Stephenson will extend an invitation to General Logan to be 
present, and lie will probably deliver a short address to the soldiers 
there. General Logan will remain here several days. 

Bangor, Me., June 18th. — Messrs. Blaine and Logan, with Senator 
Hale, arrived here to-night on their return from Ellsworth. They were 
met by an immense crowd and escorted to Stetson Square, where a plat- 



LOGAN ON THE PRESIDENTIAL TICKET. 331 

form had been erected. Mayor Humphrey called the assemblage to 
order, and introduced Chief-Justice Appleton, who welcomed the dis- 
tinguished guests. He was followed by the Hon. S. S. Blake. 

Mr. Blaine made a few remarks, and General Logan spoke at length. 
Both speakers were frequently interrupted by cheers and applause. 

blaine's speech at bangor when presenting general logan 
to its citizens — logan's handsome tribute to james g. 

BLAINE. 

Mr. Blaine's speech on the night of June 18th, in present- 
ino- General Lo^an to the immense crowd of citizens of Ban- 
gor assembled to welcome the two great leaders of the Re- 
publican Party, was as follows : 

I have so often in the past had the honor of a Bangor welcome that 
I know its depth and sincerity, and I am sure it was never extended to 
me on any occasion before, when it was so grateful as it is to-day. I 
expected to encounter no such large assemblage as this. General Lo- 
gan came to Maine on no public errand, but on a personal visit to my- 
self and to our distinguished fellow-citizen, Senator Hale ; but the ardor 
of the Republicans of Maine would not permit him to go beyond our 
borders without making manifest to him the cordiality with which he is 
welcomed to our homes and firesides. I am travelling only as his attend- 
ant, and to represent you as the Maine host in giving him a welcome 
within our borders. 

Mr. Blaine here remarked facetiously that no man can play the hero 
among his own familiar friends, and that that must be reserved to him 
if he went to other States. [Laughter and applause.] 

We are friends and neighbors, and I wish you to join me, as I am 
sure you will, in doing honor to that illustrious citizen of Illinois, at 
one time one of the great Democratic leaders of that State, who, when 
his country was in peril, forgot all political devotion and division, and 
drew his sword in defence of the Union. [Great applause.] I there- 
fore have the honor, as it is also a pleasure, to present to you the great 
and brave soldier and eloquent and eminent Senator, John A. Logan 
of Illinois. [Long and continued applause.] 

General Logan, as soon as quiet had been restored, said : 

Ladies and Gentlemen : My heart is filled with gratitude at the 
greeting I have received in the State of Maine while travelling through 



33* 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



it. Certainly, as far as I am personally concerned, I most fully appre- 
ciate the compliment that is paid by the citizens of this very beautiful 
town in its greeting to-day to your honored candidate and to myself as 
associated with him. It happens that the people of this country, from 
time to time, in accordance with the laws and customs of the Nation, 
are called upon to express their views upon the great questions that are 
agitating the public mind, and to select from their number persons to 
act as their agents and representatives in the management of the affairs 
of this great Republic of ours. A Convention recently met in the State 
where I live (Illinois), in the city of Chicago, representing all the States 
and all the Congressional Districts therein, for the purpose of selecting 
a standard-bearer for the Republican Party for the coming election. 
When the delegates — being fairly chosen and representing the people 
of all sections of the country — were assembled together they asked 
themselves, " What is best for the interests of this great country ? " The 
voice of a great majority of that Convention was that the time had come 
when broad statesmanship was required to place our country and its 
people in proper attitude before the world. The mind of that great 
Convention settled upon several propositions. They determined that 
the people wanted a man of broad statesmanship for its Presidential 
candidate, that they wanted a man of understanding and experience in 
public affairs. They wanted a man who sympathized fully with all the 
great interests of the country. They wanted a man who had manifested 
by his conduct in public life that he possesses an appreciation of the 
sentiment that pervades all classes of the people for the welfare and 
future progress of our common country. They felt that it would be 
prudent to take for a candidate a man who understands and appreci- 
ates our foreign relations, as well as our diversified internal interests ; 
a man who has the ability to see that every right and interest should 
be cared for and protected ; a man who would seek to preserve to us 
the advantages of our trade and commerce, and to keep open the 
avenues by which we may dispose of our manufactures and surplus 
productions, in order that our financial and material prosperity may be 
ever increasing. When these considerations weighed upon the minds 
of that Convention, although there were many other good and honor- 
able names mentioned that were strongly supported as well fitted for 
the position, the great majority of the delegates turned their eyes to 
your proud State, and said, " The man who comes nearer to filling the 
bill than any other names spoken of is the statesman James G. Blaine, 
of the Pine Tree State of Maine." [Tremendous and long-continued 
applause.] 



LOGAN ON THE PRESIDENTIAL TICKET. 333 

Further telegrams of General Logan's movements in 
Maine were as follows : 

Augusta, Me., June 18th.— Mr. Blaine and party arrived here at 
10.45 P - M - b y a P" llman train - A11 were driven to Mr. Blaine's resi- 
dence, where they will remain to-night. General Logan and Senator 
and Mrs. Hale leave for Washington to-morrow. 

Augusta, Me., June 19th. — Upon invitation of Colonel Smith, Gen- 
eral Logan and Senator Hale visited the Soldiers' Home at Togus to- 
day, arriving there at twelve o'clock. As the party made their appear- 
ance, General Stephenson, the Governor of the Home, had the soldiers, 
to the number of nine hundred, drawn up in line, and a salute of seven- 
teen guns was fired. 

General Logan was presented to the men by General Stephenson, 
and made a speech. As he finished he was given three rousing cheers. 
Senator Hale also spoke, and, after taking lunch, the party returned 
to Augusta, and will leave for Washington at 3.50 o'clock this after- 
noon. 

RESOLUTIONS OF THE STATE REPUBLICAN ASSOCIATIONS AT THE 
NATIONAL CAPITAL LOGAN'S STRENGTH IN INDIANA, ETC. 

In the mean time, the various State Republican Associa- 
ciations, at Washington, were holding meetings and adopt- 
ing resolutions strongly indorsing both Blaine and Logan. 
The Maryland State Republican Association, besides in- 
dorsing the administration of President Arthur, adopted this 
resolution : 

Resolved, That however the members of this Association, in common 
with other Republicans, may have differed in opinion respecting the 
Presidential and Vice-Presidential candidates to whom should be com- 
mitted with greatest assurance Of success in the pending contest the 
standard of the Republican Party, they heartily ratify the action of 
the Chicago Convention of 1884 in presenting for the suffrages of the 
American people in November next those eminently representative 
Americans, the brilliant civic leader James G. Blaine, and the not 
less brilliant soldier John A. Logan, a second conjunction of Maine 
and Illinois, full of the presage of a Republican victory as decisive 
as that of i860. 

On June 16th the Ohio Republican Association adopted 
resolutions, the first of which was a splendid indorsement of 



«« A LIFE OF LOGAN. 

and tribute to the head of the ticket, while the second read 

thus : 

Resolved, That we cordially indorse and ratify the nomination of that 
hero of two wars, the fearless and able soldier statesman, John A. Logan, 
as a candidate for the high office of Vice-President of the United States. 
In him we recognize a soldier whose courage and fidelity have never 
been doubted, a military chieftain great among the greatest in the 
world's history, a statesman whose ability, logic, and eloquence place 
him in the front rank of the great statesmen of the age, and whose voice 
and whose votes in both branches of Congress have supported the great 
measures of public policy which have blessed the age in which we live. 

These are simply given as samples of the resolutions 
passed by the various State Associations. 

From an interview with a defeated candidate, as given by 
the Washington Post the day after the Republican nomina- 
tions had been made at Chicago, it appears that — 

In regard to the nomination of General Logan for the Vice-Presi- 
dency, Senator Edmunds said, " It is the best thing that could possibly 
be done. The soldier element will be most fittingly recognized in the 
selection." 

In the same paper, Senator Cameron, of Wisconsin, was 
reported as saying : 

Mr. Blaine is without doubt the preference of a majority of the 
Republicans. I am a strong personal admirer of General Logan and 
should have been glad to see him nominated, but I am heartily pleased 
with the result as it is, and have not a doubt of the success of the 
ticket. 

The Washington Republican of June 17th, said : 

Congressman Calkins of Indiana has a firm belief in the ability of 
the Republicans to carry his State this year. Senator Logan's nomina- 
tion for the Vice-Presidency, he says, will make the National ticket 
peculiarly strong there. 

On June 19th, the Republican State Convention of Indiana 
met, and Mr. Calkins was nominated for Governor on the 
first ballot. It is hardly necessary to say that the Conven- 



LOGAN ON THE PRESIDENTIAL TICKET 335 

tion ratified and approved the nomination of Blaine and Lo- 
gan, and pledged to them " the united and earnest support 
of the Republican Party of Indiana." 

GREAT RATIFICATION MEETING AT WASHINGTON AN IMMENSE 

GATHERING, ADDRESSED BY LEADING REPUBLICANS TWO 

OVERFLOW MEETINGS GOOD THINGS SAID OF BOTH BLAINE 

AND LOGAN. 

On the evening of June 20th, a Blaine and Logan ratifica- 
tion meeting was held at Washington. The National Repub- 
lican said of it that it was " the most imposing political demon- 
stration ever witnessed in this city. The crowd far exceeded 
the limits of a mass meeting, and it was possible for only 
small sections of the great assembly to come within range of 
the speakers' voices, although there were three stands from 
which some of the best orators in the land declaimed. This 
is going to be the people's campaign, and the outpouring of 
the people last night is a promise of what is going to happen 
wherever free discussion is possible. There have been no 
names before the people these many years that evoke such 
enthusiasm as Blaine and Logan. They were nominated in 
obedience to the popular voice, and the same power will elect 
them." 

From the lengthy account, in the same paper, of this re- 
markable demonstration, under the heading " Victory in the 
Air," the following description of the scene is taken : 

The nomination of Blaine and Logan was ratified last night in front 
of the City Hall in " thunder tones." The vast concourse present repre- 
sented every State and Territory in the Union, and the great enthusiasm 
of the multitude, coupled with a brilliant display of pyrotechnics, elec- 
tric lights, and decorations, formed a thrilling and picturesque scene. 
The sea of heads in front of the court-house building was brought into 
bold relief by an almost daylight of electricity from four large illumi- 
nators, representing 16,000 candle power. The high statue of Abraham 
Lincoln in the centre of the crowd stood like a grim and motionless 
sentinel, reflecting its whiteness in the glare of showers of bursting 



2^6 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

rockets, Roman candles, and mines. Added to the brilliant spectacle, 
Greek fires crimsoned the scene at intervals, while the reflective light 
of several strong electric blazes on the capitol dome glanced over the 
house-tops and produced a weird moonlight effect among the elaborate 
decorations on the top and along the high pillars of the City Hall 
building. Cresting and entirely concealing the key-stone arch on the 
peak of the main building was a large golden sunburst that twinkled 
prettily in the blaze of light. Below were large colored paintings on 
canvas of James G. Blaine and John A. Logan. Over the portraits in 
semicircle the legend appeared in prominent letters : " The People's 
Choice, 1885." Descending from the peak to the speakers' stand in 
front were long lines of flaunting flags, streamers, and banners. The 
emblems of every nation were among the number, and the stand was 
literally concealed beneath masses of fluttering bunting and silk of 
all the bright colors. In the rear of the speakers' stand, thousands 
of chairs had been provided for invited guests and their lady friends. 
Every chair was occupied. Just before dark, and while crowds were 
pouring in from the side streets, a brisk southwest wind sprang up, and 
it looked for a time as though rain would fall. Old Boreas, however, 
appeared to be in full sympathy with the meeting, and his breath swept 
away the masses of darkening clouds that had been hovering threaten- 
ingly overhead and left a dark-blue background of sky. The showers 
of fiery balls that were shot upward seemed to disappear in this blue 
field of atmosphere, while the rockets wriggled upward like snakes and 
left trails like those of meteors. 

The full Marine Band, led by Professor Sousa, started the enthu- 
siasm, which continued throughout the night. The band opened the 
proceedings by playing, "We will follow where the white plume waves." 
Fully eight thousand voices cheered the tune, and waved their hats 
and handkerchiefs in the air. A great many ladies were present. The 
throng became so great before nine o'clock that it was necessary to open 
"overflow meetings" on the east and west porticoes. 

The resolutions, unanimously adopted at this grand rati- 
fication meeting, were very strong, and after giving weighty 
reasons for the election of Mr. Blaine, and indorsing him in 
the highest possible terms, included also the following: 

And do resolve, That we cordially and heartily indorse and ratify the 
nomination of that hero of two wars, the fearless and able soldier- 
statesman, John A. Logan, as our candidate for the high office of Vice- 
President of the United States. In him we recognize a soldier whose 



LOGAN ON THE PRESIDENTIAL TICKET. y^ 

courage and fidelity have never been doubted, a military chieftain great 
among the greatest in the world's history, and a statesman whose ability, 
logic, and eloquence place him in the front rank of the great statesmen 
of the age, and whose voice and whose votes in both branches of Con- 
gress have supported the great measures of public policy which have 
blessed the age in which we live. 

In opening the meeting, Judge Shellabarger, of Ohio, 
who was introduced, as chairman of the meeting, by Senator 
Hawley of Connecticut, said some handsome things of Mr. 
Blaine, and then, says the report, " he eulogized Logan for 
his patriotism and bravery, and denounced the slanderous 
things said of both." Among letters from prominent persons 
read by the chairman, one from Senator Hale of Maine, after 
referrino- in befitting terms to the nomination of the great 
leader heading the Presidential ticket, continued : 

The Convention joined with him, as candidate for Vice-President, 
one of the most distinguished civilians and soldiers of the Republic, of 
whom Colonel Theodore Lyman of Massachusetts, although opposing 
the nominations, says, " General Logan is a brave, frank, and honest 
man." 

SPEECHES OF SHERMAN, FRYE, HARRISON, HAWLEY, DOUGLASS, 
RAUM, REED, PHELPS, HARRIS, PERKINS, PETTIBONE, DING- 
LEY, HORR, SMALLS, G0FF, MILLER, BAYNE, MILLIKEN, SIMMS, 
AND OTHERS. 

In his ringing speech on this occasion, Senator Sherman, 
of Ohio said : 

That Blaine and Logan have been fairly nominated by the free 
choice of our eight hundred delegates, representing the Republicans 
of every State, county, and district in the broad extent of our great 
country, is admitted by every man whose voice has been heard. 

They are not "dark horses." Their names are known to fame ; the 
evil and good that men could say of them had been said with a license 
that is a shame to free discussion. Travelling in peace and in war 
through the memorable events of a quarter of a century, they have 
kept their place in the busy jostling of political life well in the fore- 
ground. 



3& 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



And now they have been selected from among millions of their 
countrymen to represent — not themselves, but the Republican Party of 
the United States. [Cheers.] 

They represent the American Union, one and indivisible, snatched 
by war from the perils of secession and disunion. They represent a 
strong national government, able, I trust in time, not only to protect 
our citizens from foreign tyranny, but from local cruelty, intolerance, 
and oppression. 

They represent that party in the country which would scorn to ob- 
tain or hold power by depriving by crime and fraud more than a mill- 
ion of men of their equal rights as citizens. They represent a party that 
would give to the laboring men of our country the protection of our 
revenue laws against undue competition with foreign labor. 

They represent the power, the achievements, and the aspirations of 
the Republican Party, that now, for twenty-four years, has been greatly 
trusted by the people, and in return has greatly advanced your country 
in strength and wealth, intelligence, courage, and hope, and in the re- 
spect and wonder of mankind. 

What we want now is an American policy broad enough to embrace 
the continent, conservative enough to protect the rights of every man, 
poor as well as rich, and brave enough to do what is right, whatever 
stands in the way. We want protection to American citizens and pro- 
tection to American laborers, a free vote and a fair count, an assertion 
of all the powers of the Government in doing what is right. It is be- 
cause I believe that the administration of Blaine and Logan will give us 
such a policy, and that I know the Democratic Party is not capable of 
it, that I invoke your aid and promise you mine to secure the election 
of the Republican ticket. 

At the conclusion of Senator Sherman's stirring speech, 
there was great applause and cheering ; and then a glee club, 
accompanied by the famous Marine Band, rendered the new 
campaign song, " We'll Follow Where the White Plume 
Waves" — the first two verses of which run thus: 

" Stand firm from mountains unto seas, 
And arm ye for the light ; 
See waving on the loyal breeze 
Our chieftain's plume of white ! 



LOGAN ON THE PRESIDENTIAL TICKET. 339 

Blaine's snow-white crest has never bowed 

On legislative floor, 
And Logan's voice rang clear and loud 

Amid the battle's roar ;" 

— the refrain of which was soon caught by the assembled 
multitude, and rang out from ten thousand throats, ending 
with cheer upon cheer until it was repeated. 

Senator Hawley, of Connecticut, began his telling speech, 
says the report, "by calling for three cheers for James Gil- 
lespie Blaine, which was heartily responded to, then for three 
more for John Alexander Logan [a like response]." The re- 
port of this speech concludes by saying, " Loud cheering fol- 
lowed Senator Hawley's speech, and when the band struck 
up ' Marching Through Georgia,' both he and Senator Sher- 
man started the air, which was taken up by the crowd. Mean- 
while both Senators swung their hats and encouraged the 
crowd to sing." 

In reporting the "Eastern overflow" of this immense 
gathering, the same paper says : 

The meeting on the east portico was conducted by General Green 
B. Raum. The first speaker, Hon. Thomas B. Reed of Maine, was re- 
ceived with an outburst of applause. He prophesied Blaine and Logan's 
election by an overwhelming majority. . . . Hon. Thomas Bayne 
of Pennsylvania followed. . . . Hon. William Walter Phelps of New 
Jersey followed in a flashing speech. He said Blaine and Logan were 
nominated by the people. The people were all there. The East and the 
West boastful of past achievements, the South hopeful of future achieve- 
ments, the wealth of New York, the culture of Boston, the farmer and 
the mechanic, the native and the naturalized citizen, the boss, the office- 
holder, the colored voter— all the interests of the mighty Republican 
Party there found representation and a free and equal share in its delib- 
erations and conclusions. 

Judge Harris, ex-member of Congress from Mississippi, was next in- 
troduced. He predicted a great victory for the nominees, and gains in 
the South. 

Hon. M. Perkins of Kansas succeeded Judge Harris. He said the 
West would fall in solidly for Blaine and Logan. The ticket is strong 
and will win. 



34Q 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



Hon. T. Pettibone of Tennessee followed. He said the ticket was 
" brains and pluck at one end, and pluck and brains at the other. The 
records of Congress for a quarter of a century bear witness to their 
patriotism and to their manly eloquence. The Republican platform is 
no straddling compromise. It says what it means when it declares 
against the importation of pauper labor, either European or Chinese. 
The plain people are going to elect the ticket in November, and don't 
you forget it. North, South, East, and West join in this grand acclaim, 
because 

Don't you hear the slogan? 

'Tis James G. Blaine and John A. Logan." 

Mr. Cunningham, a young man from Nebraska, came forward and 
gave a statistical statement of the States, Blaine and Logan would carry. 
He was loudly applauded. 

Governor Dingley of Maine was the last speaker from the east 
portico. He said the enthusiasm of the grand scene before him pres- 
aged victory in November. The nomination of James G. Blaine and 
John A. Logan had been made in response to the wishes of the Repub- 
lican voters of the United States ; and the election-day would show it to 
have been the wisest, strongest, and best nomination that could have 
been made. 

Touching- the " Western overflow " of this great mass- 
meeting, the same report said : 

The meeting on the west portico was conducted by Hon. Fred. 
Douglass. He made the opening speech, and introduced Congressman 
Belford of Colorado. The latter complimented the colored race on the 
progress they had made, and on their loyalty to the Republican Party. 
"We have nominated a strong ticket," he said, "and will have a walk- 
over." 

Hon. Mr. Milliken of Maine followed. He expressed gratification 
at the nomination of Blaine and Logan, and said success was already 
assured. 

Hon. Mr. Miller of Pennsylvania said, " Blaine and Logan are a 
strong team, and will pull through with great ease." 

Mr. Simms of Danville, Va., a Readjuster, delegate to the Conven- 
tion, said the result of the Convention was that the people had over- 
come the politicians. He asked in a loud voice, "What is a Democrat, 
my fellow-citizens ? " 

A voice in the crowd replied, "A white man." Elevating his voice 
again, the speaker said, " What is the party proficient in ? " A voice 



LOGAN ON THE PRESIDENTIAL TICKET. 341 

from behind replied, " In bulldozing." Both remarks caused great 
laughter. 

Hon. Mr. Smalls of South Carolina was next introduced. He said, 
"We have a Republican majority of 35,000 in my State, but we are 
counted out." 

Hon. Mr. Horr of Michigan was greeted with cheers upon his 
appearance, and a laugh when he said he was among those who went 
to Chicago and secured his first choice. " We looked over the list of 
distinguished men," he said, "and picked out the best two. The Dem- 
ocrats will go there and pick out two men of whom they know little. 
We selected two men who had almost been the Republican Party for 
twenty years [cheers], and the Democrats will first pick out their man, 
then find out if he has said or done anything, and if he has he won't 
do. I like to belong to a party that is proud of what it has done. 
We are not ashamed of our record. The Democrats are. They 
think of the present, and try to forget, and cry out in their misery 'for 
God's sake save us from ourselves.' I like to think of what the party 
has done when I go to bed at night, whereas if I was a Democrat I 
would be afraid to turn out the gas after dark." [Laughter.] 

General Goff, a young, boyish-looking man with a clear voice, was 
introduced, and pronounced " the nominations a fitting tribute to our 
sublime country. They are the grandest men on the continent, and 
with such candidates and such a platform to stand upon we shall know 
no such word as fail." 

Congressman O'Hara of North Carolina, when introduced, said 
that in the Southern States, Democracy was shaking. " North Caro- 
lina, with her men in the mountains, is beginning to wake up, and 
is making the welkin ring with cries for Blaine and Logan." He 
predicted victory in North Carolina. 

Senator Frye of Maine was the next speaker. He had been told 
that the Republican Party would have to fight a defensive battle. 
Defensive of what, and defensive of whom ? In 1876 the Democrats 
had an overwhelming majority in the House of Representatives. The 
Presidential election was coming on then, as it is coming on now ; and 
the Democrats determined to bring infamy on the Republican Party, 
and put it on the defensive, and they resolved themselves into a great 
investigating committee. They went to work, but the moment the 
investigating auger penetrated a single inch, it struck every time a 
writhing and a howling Democrat. [Cheers and laughter.] In less 
than two months the whole Democratic Party was whistling off the 
Democratic dogs. They deliberately determined to tear the laurels 
off the brow of the great Republican leader, and to make him bend 



, A - LIFE OF LOGAN. 

low before the American people. They penetrated the holiest of 
the penetralia. They went into the innermost temple. Nothing was 
sacred to them ; nothing private. One day Blaine went into the House 
of Representatives and said he proposed to take into his confidence 
fifty millions of his American fellow-citizens. And then he went on, 
without oratory, without ornamentation, and told his story. And 
when he completed the tale he charged upon the Democrats of the 
House and routed them, horse, foot, and dragoons. Soon afterward 
the Republican Convention was held at Cincinnati, and, although 
news came there, right on the eve of the nomination, that Blaine was 
dead or dying, or that (if he survived) his grand intellect was dead 
forever, he came within a score of votes of clearing out the whole 
field and coming off a conqueror. 

The Senator then delivered a eulogy upon Logan, who, he said, had 
as little need for defence as Blaine. 

Senator Harrison of Indiana was introduced, and said that wherever 
a thriving population was to be found throughout the land, there Blaine 
was strongest. He was strongest among the people who did not seek 
office, but helped the cause with their votes. 

This was not going to be a defensive campaign. Blaine had never 
lived behind battlements, had never heard the challenge of mortal foe 
without meeting him in the open plain. So it was with Logan. He 
did not usually wait until others sounded the call of battle. 

grand serenade by the ex-soldiers and sailors — general 
logan's thoughtful, manly, and eloquent response — 
other speeches the ticket " brains and pluck, or 

PLUCK AND BRAINS." 

On June 21st the ex-soldiers and sailors, resident in 
Washington gave a grand serenade to General Logan. The 
account of it given by the Washington Post (Democratic) of 
the next morning ran thus : 

Twelfth Street, between H and I Streets, was packed with a dense 
mass of humanity last night, the occasion being a serenade to General 
John A. Logan, Republican candidate for Vice-President, by the ex- 
soldiers and sailors residing in Washington. The procession, headed 
by the Marine Band, which moved from the City Hall to Pennsylvania 
Avenue, to Fifteenth, to New York Avenue, and thence to the residence 
of General Logan, 812 Twelfth Street, was several hundred strong, and 
as it moved along was augmented by recruits until it numbered several 



LOGAN ON THE PRESIDENTIAL TICKET 343 

thousand. For the sake of convenience the speaking took place from 
the porch of 810 Twelfth Street, one door south of General Logan's 
residence, where a stand had been erected. Both houses were thronged 
with visitors, many of them being ladies. Mrs. Logan, who had been 
quite indisposed for several days past, was able to view the demonstra- 
tion from the parlor window on the second floor. Suspended on the 
walls of the General's residence was a satin banner of four colors— red, 
white, blue, and yellow— the colors of the Army of the Tennessee. In 
the centre was a representation of a cartridge box, the symbol of Gen- 
eral Logan's old army corps— the Fifteenth. Long before the proces- 
sion arrived, fully three thousand people had gathered in the street and 
begun the pyrotechnical display by letting off rockets and Roman can- 
dles. A " chaser " occasionally caused a commotion in the crowd, to 
the great delight of the urchins who sent them on their mischievous 
errands. It was nearly nine o'clock when the head of the procession 
made its appearance amid the strains of brass music, cheers, and the 
flight of hundreds of fiery aerial messengers, which brilliantly lighted 
up the square. An electric light, at the corner of Twelfth and H 
Streets, also shot its rays upon the scene. 

While the band was playing a medley, which ended with the air of 
"We'll Follow Where the White Plume Leads," General Logan ap- 
peared on the porch, dressed in black and wearing a slouch hat, and 
was vociferously cheered. General Green B. Raum introduced him in 
a highly eulogistic address, in which he said that General Logan had 
never yet been driven to the wall, and never would be. General Logan 
then stepped forward, and, wearing glasses, read his address from man- 
uscript as follows : 

" Comrades and Fellow-Citizens : The warm expressions of confi- 
dence and congratulation which you offer me through your chairman 
impress me with a deep sense of gratitude, and I beg to tender my sin- 
cerest thanks to one and all of my participating friends for this demon- 
stration of kindness and esteem. Your visit at this time, gentlemen, is 
interesting to me in a double aspect. As citizens of our common coun- 
try, tendering a tribute to me as a public man, I meet you with genuine 
pleasure and grateful acknowledgment. Coming, however, as you do, 
in the character of representatives of the soldiers and sailors of our 
country, your visit possesses a feature insensibly leading to a train of 
most interesting reflections. Your assemblage is composed of men who 
gave up the pursuits of peace, relinquished the comforts of home, sev- 
ered the ties of friendship, and yielded the gentle and loving society 
of father, mother, sister, brother, and in many instances wife and little 
ones, to brave the dangers of the tented field or the crested wave, to 



344 LIFE 0F LOGAN. 

run the gauntlet of sickness in climates different from your own, and 
possibly, or even probably, to yield up life itself in the service of your 
country. 

"Twenty-three years ago, gentlemen, when dread war raised his 
wrinkled front throughout the land, many of you were standing with 
one foot upon the portal of manhood, eager for the conflict with the 
world, which promised to bring you honor, riches, and friends, and a 
life of peace and ease in the society of your own family. But few of 
you had passed the period of young manhood, or advanced to the open- 
ing scene of middle life. At the call, however, of your endangered coun- 
try, you did not hesitate to leave everything for which we strive in this 
world, to become defenders of the Union, without the incentive which 
has inspired men of other nations to adopt a military career as a per- 
manent occupation and as an outlet to ambition and an ascent to power. 
The safety of our country having been assured, and its territorial in- 
tegrity preserved, you sheathed the sword, unfixed the bayonet, laid 
away the musket, housed the cannon, doffed your uniforms, donned 
the garments of civil life, buried hatred toward our brothers of the 
South and shook hands in testimony of a mutual resolve to rehabilitate 
the waste places and cultivate the arts of peace until our reunited coun- 
try should be greater, prouder, and grander than ever before. Those 
years have glided into the retreating perspective of the past since you 
responded to your country's call, and mighty changes in the eventful 
march of nations have taken place. 

"This passing time has laid its gentle lines upon the heads of many 
of you who shouldered your muskets before the first beard was grown. 
But however lightly or however heavily it has dealt with you, your 
soldiers' and sailors' organizations that have been kept up, prove that 
the heart has been untouched, and that your love of country has 
but been intensified, with the advancing years. Your arms have been 
as strong and your voices as clear in the promotion of peace, as 
when lent to the science of war ; and the interest which you take in 
National affairs proves that you are patriotically determined to main- 
tain what you fought for, and that which our lost comrades gave up 
their lives to secure for the benefit of those who survived them. Dur- 
ing the last twenty years in which we have been blessed with peace, the 
Republican Party has been continued in the administration of the Gov- 
ernment. When the great question of preserving, or giving up, the 
union of the States, was presented to us, it was the Republican Party 
which affirmed its perpetuation. I open no wounds, nor do I resurrect 
any bad memories, in stating this as an undeniable fact. 

" When you and I, my friends, and that vast body of men who, hav- 



LOGAN ON THE PRESIDENTIAL TICKET. 



!45 



ing declared in favor of preserving the Union, were compelled to resort 
to the last dread measure, — the arbitrament of war, — we did so under 
the call of the Republican Party. Many of us had been educated by 
our fathers in the Democratic school of politics, and many of us were 
acting with that party at the time the issue of war was presented to 
us. For years the Democratic Party had wielded the destinies of our 
Government and had served its purpose under the narrow views of an 
ideal Republic, which then existed. But the matrix of time has de- 
veloped a new child of progress, which saw the glory of day under the 
name of the Republican Party. Its birth announced the conception of 
a higher, broader principle of human government than had been enter- 
tained by our forefathers. But few of us, perhaps none, took in the full 
dimensions of the coming fact, at that early day. It broke upon us all 
gradually, like the light of the morning sun, as he rises in the misty 
dawn above the sleepy mountain's top. At length it came in full blaze, 
and for the first time in the history of our Republic we began to give 
genuine vitality to the declaration of 1776, that 'all men are created 
equal,' and entitled to the inalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pur- 
suit of happiness. 

" The Republican Party was the unquestionable agency which bore 
these gifts to a waiting age, and it was the Democratic idea which dis- 
puted their value, first, upon the field of battle, and subsequently, and 
up to this moment, at the polling-places of the country. The Repub- 
lican party, then, represents the latest fruition of governmental pro- 
gress, and is destined to survive, upon the theory that the strong 
outlives the weak, until the development of principles still more ad- 
vanced shall compel it to measure its step with the march of the age, or 
go to the wall as an instrument which has fulfilled its destiny. So long 
as the Democratic Party shall cling, either in an open or covert manner, 
to the traditions and policy belonging to an expired era of our develop- 
ment, just so long will the Republican Party be charged with the 
administration of our Government. 

" In making this arraignment of the Democracy, my friends, I ap- 
peal to no passions, nor reopen settled questions. I but utter the calm, 
sober words of truth. I say that until every State in this broad and 
beneficent Union shall give free recognition to the civil and political 
rights of the humblest of its citizens, whatever his color ; until protec- 
tion to American citizens follows the flag at home and abroad ; until the 
admirable monetary system established by the Republican Party shall 
be placed beyond danger of subversion ; until American labor and in- 
dustry shall be protected by wise and equitable laws, so as to give full 
scope to our immense resources and place every man upon the plane to 



346 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

which he is entitled by reason of his capacity and worth ; until educa- 
tion shall be as general as our civilization ; until we shall have estab- 
lished a wise American policy that will not only preserve peace with 
other nations, but will cause every American citizen to honor his Gov- 
ernment at home, and every civilized nation to respect our flag ; until 
the American people shall permanently establish a thoroughly economic 
system upon the American idea, which will preserve and foster their 
own interests, uninfluenced by English theories or " Cobden clubs ; " and 
until it is conceded beyond subsequent revocation that this Government 
exists upon the basis of a self-sustaining, self-preserving Nation ; and 
the fatal doctrine of ' independent State sovereignty,' upon which the 
civil war was founded, shall be stamped as a political heresy, out of 
which continued revolution is born, and as wholly incompatible with 
that idea of a Republic, — the Republican Party will have much work to 
do, and an unfulfilled mission to perform. 

" The standard-bearer of the party in the ensuing campaign is the 
Hon. James G. Blaine, known throughout the land as one of its truest 
and ablest representatives. He has been called to this position by the 
voice of the people, in recognition of his especial fitness for the trust, 
and in admiration of the surprising combination of brilliancy, courage, 
faithfulness, persistency, and research that has made him one of the 
most remarkable figures which have appeared upon the forum of states- 
manship in any period of this country. That such a man should have 
enemies and detractors is as natural as that our best fruits should be in- 
fested with parasites, or that there should exist small and envious minds, 
which seek to belittle that which they can never hope to imitate or 
equal ; and that he shall triumph over these, and lead the Republican 
Party to another victory in November, is as certain as the succession of 
the seasons or the rolling of the spheres in their courses. Gentlemen, 
again I thank you for this visit of congratulation, and extend to you, 
one and all, my grateful acknowledgments. " 

General Logan read his address in a loud and distinct voice, and at 
times was vociferously applauded. Enthusiastic campaign speeches 
were then made by Senator Plumb, of Kansas; General Cutcheon, of 
Michigan; General Pettibone, of Tennessee; General Goff, of West 
Virginia ; Representative Hauback, of Kansas ; Representative George, 
of Oregon ; Hon. Alphonso Hart, of Ohio ; and Colonel D. B. Hender- 
son, of Iowa. General Pettibone, in his speech, said they called Logan 
" Black Jack " in an endearing sense, the same as they called Sherman 
in the army " Billy," and Thomas "Old Pap ;" but he would "put a 
head " on anybody who called General Logan " Black Jack " in a deri- 
sive way. The Republican ticket was a double-ender — it was brains at 



LOGAN ON THE PRESIDENTIAL TICKET. 34; 

one end, and pluck at the other, or pluck at one end, and brains at the 
other, — whichever way they chose to take it. He ended by shouting : 

Don't you hear the slogan ! 
Don't you hear the slogan ! 
It's James G. Blaine and John A. Logan. 

. . . With three cheers for Blaine and Logan, the meeting dis- 
persed. 

THE NATIONAL CONVENTION COMMITTEE OFFICIALLY NOTIFY 

GENERAL LOGAN OF HIS NOMINATION GENERAL HENDER- 

SON'S ADDRESS — GENERAL LOGAN'S RESPONSE. 

The Committee chosen at the Chicago Convention, com- 
prising one delegate from each State and Territory of the 
Union, — having already, on June 20th, formally notified Mr. 
Blaine, at Augusta, Me., of his nomination for President — 
on the 24th, having reached Washington, proceeded to the 
residence of General Logan, and were ushered into his large 
parlor. The General, said the published accounts, stood in 
the middle of the room, with Mrs. Logan at his right hand, 
and the members of the Committee were introduced to them 
by the Chairman, General Henderson of Missouri. When 
this ceremony had been performed, the company arranged 
themselves in a circle around the room to hear the address. 
The Chairman then read the formal notification of the nomina- 
tion of Senator Logan as Vice-President, as follows : 

Senator Logan : The gentlemen present constitute a committee of the 
Republican Convention, recently assembled at Chicago, charged with 
the duty of communicating to you the formal notice of your nomination 
by that Convention as a candidate for Vice-President of the United 
States. You are not unaware of the fact that your name was presented 
to the Convention and urged by a large number of the delegates as a 
candidate for President. So soon, however, as it became apparent that 
Mr. Blaine, your colleague on the ticket, was the choice of the party for 
that high office, your friends, with those of other competitors, promptly 
yielded their individual preferences to the manifest wish of the majority. 
In tendering you this nomination we are able to assure you it was made 
without opposition, and with an enthusiasm seldom witnessed in the his- 
tory of nominating conventions. 



348 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

We are gratified to know that, in a career of great usefulness and 
distinction, you have most efficiently aided in the enactment of those 
measures of legislation and of constitutional reform in which the Con- 
vention found special cause for party congratulation. The principles 
enunciated in the platform adopted will be recognized by you as the 
same which have so long governed and controlled your political conduct. 
The pledges made by the party find guarantee of performance in the 
fidelity with which you have heretofore discharged every trust confided 
to your keeping. 

In your election, the people of this country will furnish new proof of 
the excellency of our institutions. Without wealth, without help from 
others, without any resources except those of heart, conscience, intel- 
lect, energy, and courage, you have won a high place in the world's his- 
tory, and secured the confidence and affections of your countrymen. 
Being one of the people, your sympathies are with the people. In civil 
life, your chief care has been to better their condition, to secure their 
rights, and to perpetuate our liberties. When the Government was 
threatened with armed treason, you entered its service as a private, be- 
came a commander of armies, and are now the idol of the citizen sol- 
diers of the Republic. Such, in the judgment of your party, is the can- 
didate it has selected, and, in behalf of that party, we ask you to accept 
this nomination. 

To this admirable address, which was delivered both with 
dignity and feeling, and was applauded by the clapping of 
hands of the onlookers, General Logan (who had been stand- 
ing by a table upon which he rested his hand) replied as fol- 
lows : 

Mr. Chairman and Gentlemen of the Committee : I receive your 
visit with pleasure and accept with gratitude the sentiments you have so 
generously expressed in the discharge of the duty with which you have 
been intrusted by the National Convention. Intending to address you 
a formal communication shortly, in accordance with the recognized 
usage, it would be out of place to detain you at this time with remarks 
which properly belong to the official utterances of my letter of accept- 
ance. I may be permitted to say, however, that, though I did not seek the 
nomination for Vice-President, I accept it as a trust reposed in me by 
the Republican Party, to the advancement of whose broad policy on all 
questions connected with the progress of our government and our peo- 
ple I have dedicated my best energies, and with this acceptance I may 
properly signify my approval of the platform and principles adopted by 



LOGAN ON THE PRESIDENTIAL TICKET. 



349 



the Convention. I am deeply sensible of the honor conferred on me by 
my friends in so unanimous a manner tendering me this nomination, 
and I sincerely thank them for this tribute. I am not unmindful of the 
great responsibility attaching to the office, and if elected I shall enter 
upon the performance of its duties with a firm conviction that he who 
has such unanimous support of his party friends, as the circumstances 
connected with the nomination and your own words, Mr. Chairman, 
indicate, and consequently with such a wealth of counsel to draw upon, 
cannot fail in the proper way to discharge the duties devolving upon 
him. I tender you my thanks for the kind expressions you have made, 
and I offer you and your fellow-committee-men my most hearty thanks. 

The published narrations of this interesting ceremony state 
that " when General Logan had concluded his remarks, which 
were received with applause, the members of the Commit- 
tee stepped forward and shook him by the hand, and mut- 
ual congratulations were exchanged. Mrs. Logan warmly 
thanked the Committee for the sentiments conveyed in their 
address. The members of the Committee then took their 
leave, with the exception of a few, who engaged in conversa- 
tion with General Logan and his wife, and subsequently 
withdrew." 

THE LETTER OF ACCEPTANCE PROTECTION OUR FINANCIAL 

SYSTEM INTER-STATE AND FOREIGN COMMERCE FOREIGN 

RELATIONS EQUAL RIGHTS IMMIGRATION CIVIL SERVICE, 

ETC. 

General Logan's formal letter of acceptance was received 
everywhere by the press, as a clear, forcible, manly presenta- 
tion of the issues before the people. The New York Tribune 
devoted to it its leading article, in the course of which it 
said : 

Senator Logan's letter of acceptance, like that of Mr. Blaine, dis- 
cusses the vital issues of the campaign so fully and frankly that his 
position cannot well be misunderstood. It will be of great service also, 
as a proof of the hearty accord of the leading statesmen of the Repub- 
lican Party in the declaration of principles and purposes, made by the 
National Convention. Like Mr. Blaine's letter, it will be of great ser- 



3 5 LIFE OF IOGAN. 

vice as a campaign document. Though it discusses questions from 
quite different points of view, it presents considerations which add 
strength to the Republican position as stated by Mr. Blaine, and by- 
some classes of voters will be received with especial satisfaction. Its 
dignified and dispassionate tone only gives greater weight to the argu- 
ments which General Logan presents. 

The letter of acceptance was in these words : 

Washington, July 19, 1884. 

Dear Sir : Having received from you on the 24th of June the official 
notification of my nomination by the National Republican Convention 
as the Republican candidate for Vice-President of the United States, and 
considering it to be the duty of every man devoting himself to the 
public service to assume any position to which he may be called by the 
voice of his countrymen, I accept the nomination with a grateful heart 
and deep sense of its responsibilities, and if elected shall endeavor to 
discharge the duties of the office to the best of my ability. 

This honor, as is well understood, was wholly unsought by me. 
That it was tendered by the representatives of a party, in a manner so 
flattering, will serve to lighten whatever labors I may be called upon to 
perform. 

Although the variety of subjects covered in the very excellent and 
vigorous declaration of principles adopted by the late Convention pro- 
hibits, upon an occasion calling for brevity of expression, that full 
elaboration of which they are susceptible, I avail myself of party usage 
to signify my approval of the various resolutions of that platform, and 
to discuss them briefly. 

PROTECTION TO AMERICAN LABOR. 

The resolution of the platform declaring for a levy of such duties 
"as to afford security to our diversified industries and protection to the 
rights and wages of the laborer, to the end that active and intelligent 
labor, as well as capital, may have its just reward, and the laboring man 
his full share in the National prosperity," meets my hearty approval. 

If there be a Nation on the face of the earth which might, if it were 
a desirable thing, build up a wall upon its every boundary line, deny 
communion to all the world, and proceed to live upon its own re- 
sources and productions, that Nation is the United States. There is 
hardly a legitimate necessity of civilized communities which cannot be 
produced from the extraordinary resources of our several States and 
Territories, with their manufactories, mines, farms, timber lands and 
water-ways. This circumstance, taken in connection with the fact that 



LOGAN ON THE PRESIDENTIAL TICKET. 351 

our form of government is entirely unique among the Nations of the 
world, makes it utterly absurd to institute comparisons between our 
own economic systems and those of other governments, and especially 
to attempt to borrow systems from them. We stand alone in our cir- 
cumstances, our forces, our possibilities, and our aspirations. In all 
successful government it is a prime requisite that capital and labor 
should be upon the best terms, and that both should enjoy the highest 
attainable prosperity. If there be a disturbance of that just balance 
between them, one or the other suffers, and dissatisfaction follows which 
is harmful to both. 

The lessons furnished by the comparatively short history of our 
National life have been too much overlooked by our people. The 
fundamental article in the Democratic creed proclaimed almost absolute 
free trade, and this, too, no more than a quarter of a century ago. The 
low condition of our National credit, the financial and business uncer- 
tainties and general lack of prosperity under that system, can be remem- 
bered by every man now in middle life. 

Although, in the great number of reforms instituted by the Repub- 
lican Party, sufficient credit has not been publicly awarded to that of 
tariff reform, its benefits have, nevertheless, been felt throughout the 
land. The principle underlying this measure has been in process of 
gradual development by the Republican Party during the compara- 
tively brief period of its power, and to-day a portion of its antiquated 
Democratic opponents make unwilling concession to the correctness of 
the doctrine of an equitably-adjusted protective-tariff, by following 
slowly in its footsteps, though a very long way in the rear. The prin- 
ciple involved is one of no great obscurity, and can be readily compre- 
hended by any intelligent person calmly reflecting upon it. The po- 
litical and social systems of some of our trade-competing nations have 
created working-classes miserable in the extreme. They receive the 
merest stipend for their daily toil, and, in the great expense of the 
necessities of life, are deprived of those comforts of clothing, housing, 
and health-producing food, with which wholesome mental and social 
recreation can alone make existence happy and desirable. Now, if the 
products of those countries are to be placed in our markets, alongside 
of American products, either the American capitalist must suffer in his 
legitimate profits, or he must make the American laborer suffer in the 
attempt to compete with the species of labor above referred to. In the 
case of a substantial reduction of pay, there can be no compensating 
advantages for the American laborer, because the articles of daily con- 
sumption which he uses — with the exception of articles not produced in 
the United States and easy of being specially provided for, as coffee and 



35 2 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



tea — are grown in our own country, and would not be affected in price 
by a lowering of duties. Therefore, while he would receive less for his 
labor, his cost of living would not be decreased. Being practically- 
placed upon the pay of the European laborer, our own would be de- 
prived of facilities for educating and sustaining his family respectably ; 
he would be shorn of the proper opportunities of self-improvement, and 
his value as a citizen, charged with a portion of the obligations of gov- 
ernment, would be lessened, the moral tone of the laboring class would 
suffer, and in them the interests of capital, and the well-being of orderly 
citizens in general, would be menaced, while one evil would react upon 
another until there would be a general disturbance of the whole com- 
munity. The true problem of a good and stable government is, how to 
infuse prosperity among all classes of people — the manufacturer, the 
farmer, the mechanic, and the laborer alike. Such prosperity is a pre- 
ventive of crime, a security for capital, and the very best guarantee of 
general peace and happiness. 

The obvious policy of our Government is to protect both capital 
and labor by a proper imposition of duties. This protection should 
extend to every article of American production which goes to build up 
the general prosperity of our people. 

The National Convention, in view of the special dangers menacing 
the wool interest of the United States, deemed it wise to adopt a sepa- 
rate resolution on the subject of its proper protection. This industry 
is a very large and important one. The necessary legislation to sustain 
this industry upon a prosperous basis should be extended. 

None realizes more fully than myself the great delicacy and diffi- 
culty of adjusting a tariff so nicely and equitably as to protect every 
industry, sustain every class of American labor, promote to the 
highest position great agricultural interests, and at the same time to 
give to one and all the advantages pertaining to foreign productions 
not in competition with our own, thus not only building up foreign 
commerce, but taking measures to carry it in our own bottoms. 

Difficult as this work appears, and really is, it is susceptible of 
accomplishment by patient and intelligent labor, and to no hands can 
it be committed with as great assurance of success as to those of the 
Republican Party. 

AN UNEQUALLED MONETARY SYSTEM. 

The Republican Party is the indisputable author of a financial and 
monetary system which, it is safe to say, has never before been equalled 
by that of any other nation. 

Under the operation of our system of finance, the country was 



LOGAN ON THE PRESIDENTIAL TICKET. 353 

safely carried through an extended and expensive war, with a National 
credit which has risen higher and higher with each succeeding year, 
until now the credit of the United States is surpassed by that of no 
other nation, while its securities, at a constantly increasing premium, 
are eagerly sought after by investors in all parts of the world. 

Our system of currency is most admirable in construction. While 
all the conveniences of a bill-circulation attach to it, every dollar of 
paper represents a dollar of the world's money-standards, and, as long 
as the just and wise policy of the Republican Party is continued, there 
can be no impairment of the National credit. Therefore, under present 
laws relating thereto, it will be impossible for any man to lose a penny 
in the bonds or bills of the United States, or in the bills of the National 

banks. 

The advantage of having a bank-note, in the house, which will be as 
good in the morning as it was the night before, should be appreciated 
by all. The convertibility of the currency should be maintained intact, 
and the establishment of an international standard among all commer- 
cial nations, fixing the relative values of gold and silver coinage, would 
be a measure of peculiar advantage. 

INTER-STATE, FOREIGN COMMERCE, AND FOREIGN RELATIONS. 

The subjects embraced in the resolutions respectively looking to 
the promotion of our inter-State and foreign commerce and the matter 
of our foreign relations, are fraught with the greatest importance to 
our people. 

In respect to inter-State commerce there is much to be desired in the 
way of equitable rates and facilities of transportation, that commerce 
may flow freely between the States themselves, diversity of industries 
and employment be promoted in all sections of our country, and that 
the great granaries and manufacturing establishments of the interior 
may be enabled to send their products to the seaboard for shipment to 
foreign countries, relieved of vexatious restrictions and discriminations 
in matters of which it may emphatically be said "time is money," and 
also of unjust charges upon articles destined to meet close competition 
from the products of other parts of the world. 

As to our foreign commerce, the enormous growth of our indus- 
tries, and our surprising production of cereals and other necessities of 
life, imperatively require that immediate and effective means be taken, 
through peaceful, orderly, and conservative methods, to open markets 
which have been and are now monopolized largely by other nations. 
This more particularly relates to our sister republics of Spanish America, 
as also to our friends the people of the Brazilian Empire. The 
23 



354 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



republics of Spanish America are allied to us by the very closest and 
warmest feelings, based upon similarity of institutions and govern- 
ment, common aspirations, and mutual hopes. The " Great Republic" 
as they proudly term the United States, is looked upon by their people 
with affection and admiration, and as the model for them to build upon, 
and we should cultivate between them and ourselves closer commercial 
relations, which will bind all together by the ties of friendly intercourse 
and mutual advantage. Further than this, being small commonwealths, 
in the military and naval sense of the European powers, they look to 
us as, at least, a moral defender against a system of territorial and other 
encroachments which, aggressive in the past, has not been abandoned 
at this day. Diplomacy and intrigue have done much more to wrest 
the commerce of Spanish America from the United States than has 
legitimate commercial competition. 

Politically we should be bound to the republics of our continent by 
the closest ties, and communication by ships and railroads should be 
encouraged to the fullest possible extent consistent with a wise and 
conservative public policy. Above all, we should be upon such terms 
of friendship as to preclude the possibility of national misunderstand- 
ings between ourselves and any of the members of the American 
republican family. The best method to promote uninterrupted peace, 
between one and all, would lie in the meeting of a general conference 
or congress, whereby an agreement to submit all international differ- 
ences to the peaceful decisions of friendly arbitration might be reached. 
An agreement of this kind would give to our sister republics confi- 
dence in each other and in us, closer communication would at once 
ensue, and reciprocally advantageous commercial treaties might be 
made, whereby much of the commerce which now flows across the 
Atlantic would seek its legitimate channels, and inure to the greater 
prosperity of all the American commonwealths. The full advantages of 
a policy of this nature could not be stated in a brief discussion like 
the present. 

FOREIGN POLITICAL RELATIONS. 

The United States has grown to be a Government representing 
more than 50,000,000 people, and in every sense, excepting that of 
mere naval power, is one of the first nations of the world. As such, 
its citizenship should be valuable, entitling its possessor to protection 
in every quarter of the globe. I do not consider it necessary that 
our Government should construct enormous fleets of approved iron- 
clads, and maintain a commensurate body of seamen, in order to place 
ourselves on a war-footing with the military and naval powers of 



LOGAN ON THE PRESIDENTIAL TICKET. 355 

Europe. Such a course would not be compatible with the peaceful 
policy of our country, though it seems absurd that we have not the 
effective means to repel a wanton invasion of our coast, and give pro- 
tection to our coast towns and cities against any power. The great 
moral force of our country is so universally recognized as to render 
an appeal to arms by us, either in protection of our citizens abroad or 
in recognition of any just international right, quite improbable. What 
we most need, in this direction, is a firm and vigorous assertion of every 
right and privilege belonging to our Government or its citizens, as well 
as an equally firm assertion of the rights and privileges belonging to 
the general family of American republics situated upon this continent, 
when opposed, if they ever should be, by the different system of gov- 
ernments upon another continent. 

An appeal to the right, by such a Government as ours, could not be 
disregarded by any civilized nation. 

In the Treaty of Washington we led the world to the means of 
escape from the horrors of war, and it is to be hoped that the era when 
all international differences shall be decided by peaceful arbitration is 
not far off. 

EQUAL RIGHTS OF CITIZENSHIP. 

The central idea of a republican form of government, is the rule of 
the whole people, as opposed to the other forms which rest upon a 
privileged class. 

Our forefathers, in the attempt to erect a new government which 
might represent the advanced thought of the world, at that period, upon 
the subject of governmental reform, adopted the idea of the people's 
sovereignty, and thus laid the basis of our present Republic. While 
technically a government of the people, it was in strictness only a 
government of a portion of the people, excluding from all participation 
a certain other portion held in a condition of absolutely despotic and 
hopeless servitude, the parallel to which fortunately does not now exist 
in any modern Christian nation. 

With the culmination, however, of another cycle of advanced thought, 
the American Republic suddenly assumed the full character of a govern- 
ment of the whole people, and four million human creatures emerged 
from the condition of bondsmen to the full status of freemen, theoreti- 
cally invested with the same social and political rights possessed by 
their former masters. The subsequent legislation which guaranteed by 
every legal title the citizenship, and full equality before the law in all 
respects, of this previously disfranchised people, amply covers the re- 
quirements, and secures to them, so far as legislation can, the privileges 



*r6 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

of American citizenship. But the disagreeable fact of the case is, that 
while, theoretically, we are in the enjoyment of a government of the 
whole people, practically we are almost as far from it as we were in the 
antebellum days of the Republic. There are but a few leading and in- 
disputable facts which cover the whole statement of the case. In many 
of the Southern States the colored population is in large excess of the 
white. The colored people are Republicans, as is also a considerable 
portion of the white people. The remaining portion of the latter are 
Democrats. In face of this incontestable truth, these States invariably 
return Democratic majorities. In other States of the South, the colored 
people, although not a majority, form a very considerable body of the 
population, and, with the white Republicans, are numerically in excess 
of the Democrats, yet precisely the same political result obtains — the 
Democratic Party invariably carrying the elections. It is not even 
thought advisable to allow an occasional or unimportant election to be 
carried by the Republicans as a "blind," or as a stroke of finesse. 

Careful and impartial investigation has shown these results to follow 
the systematic exercise of physical intimidation and violence, conjoined 
with the most shameful devices ever practised in the name of free elec- 
tions. So confirmed has this result become, that we are brought face 
to face with the extraordinary political fact, that the Democratic Party 
of the South relies almost entirely upon the methods stated for its suc- 
cess in National elections. 

This unlawful perversion of the popular franchise, which I desire to 
state dispassionately and in a manner comporting with the proper dig- 
nity of the occasion, is one of deep gravity to the American people in a 
double sense. 

First. It is a violation, open, direct, and flagrant, of the primary 
principle upon which our Government is supposed to rest, viz., that the 
control of the Government is participated in by all legally qualified 
citizens, in accordance with the plan of popular government that majori- 
ties must rule in the decision of all questions. 

Second. It is in violation of the rights and interests of the States 
wherein are particularly centred the great wealth and industries of the 
Nation, and which pay an overwhelming portion of the National taxes. 
The immense aggregation of interests embraced within, and the enor- 
mously greater population of, these other States of the Union, are sub- 
jected every four years to the dangers of a wholly fraudulent show of 
numerical strength. Under this system, minorities actually attempt to 
direct the course of National affairs, and though, up to this time, suc- 
cess has not attended their efforts to elect a President, yet success has 
been so perilously imminent as to encourage a repetition of the effort 



LOGAN ON THE PRESIDENTIAL TICKET. 



357 



at each quadrennial election, and to subject the interests of an over- 
whelming majority of our people, North and South, to the hazards of 
illegal subversion. 

The stereotyped argument in refutation of these plain truths is, that 
if the Republican element was really in majority, they could not be de- 
prived of their rights and privileges by a minority ; but neither statistics 
of population nor the unavoidable logic of the situation can be overrid- 
den or overcapped. The colored people have recently emerged from 
the bondage of their present political oppressors ; they had had but few 
of the advantages of education which might enable them to compete 
with the whites. 

As I have heretofore mentioned, in order to achieve the ideal of per- 
fection of a popular government, it is absolutely necessary that the 
masses should be educated. This proposition applies itself with full 
force to the colored people of the South. They must have better edu- 
cational advantages, and thus be enabled to become the intellectual peers 
of their white brethren, as many of them undoubtedly already are. A 
liberal school system should be provided for the rising generation of the 
South, and the colored people be made as capable of exercising the du- 
ties of electors as the white people. In the meantime it is the duty of 
the National Government to go beyond resolutions and declarations 
on the subject, and to take such action as may lie in its power to secure 
the absolute freedom of National elections everywhere, to the end that 
our Congress may cease to contain members representing fictitious 
majorities of their people, — thus misdirecting the popular will concern- 
ing National legislation, — and especially to the end that, in Presidential 
contests, the great business and other interests of the country mav not 
be placed in fear and trembling lest an unscrupulous minority should 
succeed in stifling the wishes of the majority. 

In accordance with the spirit of the last resolution of the Chicago 
platform, measures should be taken at once to remedy this great evil. 

FOREIGN IMMIGRATION. 

Under our liberal institutions the subjects and citizens of every na- 
tion have been welcomed to a home in our midst, and, on compliance 
with our laws, to a co-operation in our Government. While it is the 
policy of the Republican Party to encourage the oppressed of other 
nations, and offer them facilities for becoming useful and. intelligent 
citizens in the legal definition of the term, the party has never contem- 
plated the admission of a class of servile people who are not only unable 
to comprehend our institutions, but indisposed to become a part of our 
National family or to embrace any higher civilization than their own. 



358 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

To admit such immigrants, would be only to throw a retarding element 
into the very path of our progress. Our legislation should be amply 
protective against this danger, and if not sufficiently so now, should be 
made so to the full extent allowed by our treaties with friendly powers. 

THE CIVIL SERVICE. 

The subject of civil-service administration, is a problem that has oc- 
cupied the earnest thought of statesmen for a number of years past, and 
the record will show that, toward its solution, many results of a valua- 
ble and comprehensive character have been attained by the Republican 
Party since its accession to power. In the partisan warfare made upon 
the latter, with the view of weakening it in the public confidence, a 
great deal has been alleged in connection with the abuse of the civil 
service, the party making the indiscriminate charges seeming to have 
entirely forgotten that it was under the full sway of the Democratic or- 
ganization that the motto "to the victors belong the spoils" became a 
cardinal article in the Democratic creed. 

With the determination to elevate our Governmental Administration 
to a standard of justice, excellence, and public morality, the Republican 
Party has sedulously endeavored to lay the foundation of a system which 
shall reach the highest perfection under the plastic hand of time and 
accumulating experience. The problem is one of far greater intricacy 
than appears upon its superficial consideration, and embraces the sub- 
questions of how to avoid the abuses possible to the lodgment of an 
immense number of appointments in the hands of the Executive ; of 
how to give encouragement to and provoke emulation in the various 
Government employees, in order that they may strive for proficiency 
and rest their hopes of advancement upon the attributes of official merit, 
good conduct, and exemplary honesty ; and how best to avoid the evils 
of creating a privileged class in the Government service, who, in imita- 
tion of European prototypes, may gradually lose all proficiency and 
value in the belief that they possess a life-calling, only to be taken away 
in case of some flagrant abuse. 

The thinking, earnest men of the Republican Party have made no 
mere wordy demonstration upon this subject, but they have endeavored 
to quietly perform that which their opponents are constantly promising 
without performing. Under Republican rule, the result has been that, 
without engrafting any of the objectionable features of the European 
systems upon our own, there has been a steady and even rapid eleva- 
tion of the civil service in all of its departments, until it can now be 
stated, without fear of successful contradiction, that the service is more 
just, more efficient, and purer in all of its features than ever before since 



LOGAN ON THE PRESIDENTIAL TICKET. 



359 



the establishment of our Government ; and, if defects still exist in our 
system, the country can safely rely upon the Republican Party as the 
most efficient instrument for their removal. 

I am in favor of the highest standard of excellence in the adminis- 
tration of the civil service, and will lend my best efforts to the accom- 
plishment of the greatest attainable perfection of this branch of our 
service. 

THE REMAINING TWIN RELIC OF BARBARISM. 

The Republican Party came into existence in a crusade against the 
Democratic institutions of slavery and polygamy. The first of these has 
been buried beneath the embers of civil war. The party should con- 
tinue its efforts until the remaining iniquity shall disappear from our 
civilization, under the force of faithfully executed laws. 

There are other subjects of importance which I would gladly touch 
upon did space permit. I limit myself to saying, that while there should be 
the most rigid economy of Governmental Administration, there should 
be no self-defeating parsimony either in our domestic or foreign service. 
Official dishonesty should be promptly and relentlessly punished. Our 
obligations to the defenders of our country should never be forgotten, 
and the liberal system of pensions provided by the Republican Party 
should not be imperilled by adverse legislation. The law establishing a 
Labor Bureau, through which the interests of labor can be placed in an 
organized condition, I regard as a salutary measure. The eight-hour 
law should be enforced as rigidly as any other. We should increase our 
navy to a degree enabling us to amply protect our coast-lines, our com- 
merce, and to give us a force in foreign waters which shall be a respect- 
able and proper representative of a country like our own. The public 
lands belong to the people, and should not be alienated from them, but 
reserved for free homes for all desiring to possess them ; and, finally, 
our present Indian policy should be continued and improved upon as 
our experience in its administration may from time to time suggest. I 
have the honor to subscribe myself, sir, your obedient servant, 

John A. Logan. 
To the Hon. John B. Henderson, Chairman of the Committee. 

GENERAL LOGAN'S JOURNEY TO MINNEAPOLIS AN ENTHUSIAS- 
TIC OVATION ALL THE WAY FROM PITTSBURG — GRAND RE- 
CEPTION AT MINNEAPOLIS THE MEETING OF THE GRAND 

ARMY THE GREATEST DEMONSTRATION OF THE NORTHWEST. 

On Saturday night, July 19, 1884, General Logan left 
Washington to attend the Reunion of the Grand Army of the 



J 



60 LIFE OF IOGAN. 



Republic, at Minneapolis, Minn. The story of his journey 
from Pittsburg onward is thus briefly told in the special de- 
spatches of the New York Tribune: 

Crestline, O., July 21st.— The journey of General Logan through 
Ohio to-day has been a continuous ovation with a delegation of the 
Grand Army of the Republic. He left Washington at 10 p.m. on Satur- 
day in a car attached to the regular train, arriving in Pittsburg on 
Sunday forenoon. There, a large crowd greeted him, anxious to shake 
him by the hand and clamoring for autographs, which the General 
cheerfully gave. On leaving Pittsburg the crowds grew larger and 
the enthusiasm increased. In the larger towns, like Alliance, Canton, 
Massillon, Wooster, men, women, and children clambered into the train 
to shake the General's hand, and lined the tops of freight-cars, cheer- 
ing, and waving handkerchiefs. The people everywhere were eager for 
a speech, but, as it was Sunday, the General declined. At Mansfield, 
the home of Senator Sherman, a big crowd awaited the arrival of the 
train. Though the hour was late, a cordial greeting was extended to 
the General, and assurances of a big majority for the ticket were given. 
Singing, by campaign glee-clubs, forms part of the demonstration in 
every city. The numbers of the crowds and the enthusiasm manifested, 
considering the day, are as surprising as they are gratifying. The train 
will arrive in Chicago at 7.50 a.m. to-morrow. 

Minneapolis, Minn., July 22d. — All the incoming trains are running 
in sections, being loaded down with Grand Army delegations. Gen- 
eral Logan reached here at noon to-day, on a special train over the 
Milwaukee road, and was given a grand reception all along the line of 
march from the depot to the residence of General Washburne, whose 
guest he is. General Sherman has arrived in the city. He was received 
with great enthusiasm. The Flambeau Club, of Topeka, Kan., which 
arrived to-day, attracts much attention. This afternoon, at Camp 
Beath, a formal welcome was extended to all visitors. Speeches were 
made by Major Pillsbury, Governor Hubbard, and Commander Beath. 

All the private residences in St. Paul and Minneapolis have been 
thrown open, yet the crowd of visitors can hardly be accommodated. 
It is estimated that 40,000 veterans are in the city. They will all take 
part in the grand parade to-morrow. To-morrow afternoon and evening 
there will be numerous banquets and receptions. 

Minneapolis, July 23d. — The parade of the Grand Army of the Re- 
public was delayed in forming. It was received with tremendous cheers 
by 60,000 people, who thronged every street on the line of march. The 
weather was fair, but sultry. The whole of the Grand Army was in line, 



LOGAN ON THE PRESIDENTIAL TICKET. 361 

and it was the largest demonstration since the war. ... At noon 
the parade passed the City Hall, where children, on canopied platforms, 
waved banners and sang an old war-song, which the veterans took up 
as they passed on with uncovered heads. The tattered battle-flags were 
recognized by the veterans with shouts. The enthusiasm was never 
equalled here, and it is the greatest of all demonstrations ever witnessed 
in the Northwest. 

There is no truth in the rumor that an accident occurred by which 
General Logan was hurt. 

logan's reception elsewhere — his more than royal prog- 
ress THROUGH THE STATES HIS EXHAUSTING CAMPAIGN- 
LABORS RESULTS OF THE ELECTION HOW GRACEFULLY LO- 
GAN ACCEPTED IT. 

As it had been in Maine, in Ohio, and in Minnesota, so 
was it afterward in New York, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, 
and all the many Western States through which Logan 
travelled and spoke to countless masses of men and women 
drawn to meet him by the magic of his name and the lustre 
of his imperishable deeds on fields of battle and in the council- 
chambers of the Nation. His movements evoked the un- 
precedented interest of the people, and fired all the enthusi- 
asm of their natures. Defying alike the heats of summer and 
the rains and chills of autumn, through all the long months 
until early November, Logan, the hero of the people and 
idol of the old soldiery, swept on, from State to State, — in 
an almost royal progress, reminding one of the triumphs 
awarded, in the elder world, by Rome, to her conquering 
heroes, — his pathway strewn with flowers and spanned by 
triumphant arches, escorted by plumed knights and marching 
cohorts with waving banners, while the air trembled with the 
sweet sound of jubilant music, and the hoarse thunders of 
artillery salutes, and the loud acclaim of exulting multitudes. 
The thousands of miles of railroad-journeying ; the draughts 
upon his strength in meeting and addressing so many enormous 
audiences ; the incessant demands upon his time and vitality 



,62 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

made by innumerable visitors and hand-shakings wherever 
he temporarily stayed ; these, in addition to the conduct of an 
immense correspondence, and all the other perplexities, an- 
noyances, anxieties, and industries of that ever-memorable 
campaign, must inevitably have broken down any constitution 
less powerful than that of Logan. But his energy was as 
boundless as his vitality seemed inexhaustible ; and not until 
the very day of election did he permit himself to rest from 
his herculean labors. Then, reaching Chicago, he voted, 
and at his residence there, calmly awaited the result. What 
that result was ; how, through no fault of Logan, the pivotal 
State of New York — and with it the election — was lost to the 
Republican column by a mere handful of votes ; and how 
gracefully and good-humoredly Logan accepted it ; — is known 
of all men. 



PART V. 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 

logan's memorably gallant fight for the Illinois sena- 

torship hopeless odds against him he wins his third 

senatorial term he addresses the legislature. 

General Logan was so absorbed in the great Presidential 
contest of 1884, that he gave little or no attention to the fight 
for the control of the Legislature of Illinois. In fact, so en- 
tirely was his time taken up with the larger, National, field of 
action, that he had to leave to others the local legislative 
field. As a consequence, the Legislature was politically tied 
between the two great parties, and, but for the subsequent 
activity of the General and his friends in exposing the fla- 
grant frauds, perpetrated by the Democratic managers in one 
of the election precincts of Chicago, and bringing the perpe- 
trators to justice, the Illinois Legislature would have been 
Democratic by a majority of one on a joint ballot, and hence 
a Democrat would inevitably have been elected to succeed 
the General, at the expiration of his term, March 4, 1885. As 
it was, the outcome of the United States Senatorial contest 
in the Illinois Legislature— commencing January 4, 1885, and 
continuing for three and one-half months, — was in grave 
doubt. Logan was the caucus nominee of the Republicans ; 
and Morrison of the Democrats until near the end of the 
struggle, when Lambert Tree became their candidate. The 
stubbornness of the fight — intensified by the circumstance 
that these contestants respectively represented the opposing 
doctrines of Protective Tariff, and Free Trade in a peculiar 



364 LIFE 0F LOGAN. 

degree, — attracted to it the attention of the entire country. 
This general public interest was further intensified, as the 
balloting continued, by the patent fact that there were several 
Republicans and Democrats by no means strong enough in 
their allegiance to their respective parties to be absolutely 
depended upon ; and who occasionally voted against their 
party candidates with an evident purpose of preventing an 
election. It was notoriously believed that money-influences 
as well as other leverages were at work against the General. 
The influence and power of the Democratic National Admin- 
istration was used against him also, and toward the end Presi- 
dent Cleveland himself was said to have sent an intimation 
that " anybody but Logan " should be chosen. Furthermore 
the situation, during the long fight, was additionally compli- 
cated by the death of three members of the Legislature — 
two Democrats and one Republican. One of these deceased 
Democrats was succeeded by another Democrat and the Re- 
publican by another Republican ; and it was supposed that 
the other dead Democrat, whose district was Democratic by 
some 2,000 majority, would undoubtedly be succeeded, at the 
special election, by another Democrat. Until that election 
took place, a sort of truce prevailed, Morrison going off to 
Washington for more Administration aid, and Logan remain- 
ing watchful and alert at the Leland Hotel, Springfield. About 
this time, Daniel Shepard, and S. H. Jones of Springfield, both 
strong Republicans, suggested to the General the idea that the 
vacant representation of the Thirty-fourth Senatorial District, 
although so overwhelmingly Democratic, might be captured 
by a " still hunt." Henry Croske, of Rushville, appears also 
to have written the General on this subject, and claims to have 
suggested the plan. At all events General Logan decided 
that the Republicans of the district might in a quiet manner 
go to work and elect one of themselves. Outside the district 
itself, only four persons knew what was being done — viz. 
General Logan, Daniel Shepard, S. H. Jones, and Jacob 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 365 

Wheeler, and these kept their own counsel. Suffice it to 
say, that, in the face of many great difficulties, the plan suc- 
ceeded ; the Republican vote was polled in its full strength, 
while the usual Democratic vote, through over-security and 
consequent apathy, was comparatively small ; and Weaver, the 
Republican candidate, was elected in place of the dead Demo- 
crat, by a majority of 336 votes over his Democratic oppo- 
nent, Mr. Leeper. " The convulsion which followed this 
masterly stroke," says one of the Illinois journals, " the des- 
perate efforts of the Democrats first to hold back the returns, 
and second to keep Weaver out of his seat until the Senator- 
ship could be bought, their failure, and the triumphant elec- 
tion of General Logan, are still familiar to the public." The 
following newspaper despatch, tells at sufficient length the 
rest of this remarkable story : 

Chicago, May 19th. — General Logan has been re-elected United 
States Senator after a contest requiring all the staying powers which he 
is well known to possess. Even his enemies to-night confess that the 
victory was a splendid one and deserving, in view of his organizing it 
out of apparent defeat and in the face of open venality on the other 
side. The feeling was general that something decisive would accom- 
pany the balloting at Springfield to-day, and swarms of politicians of 
both parties from all over the State arrived there this morning. As the 
time for the joint session approached, every inch of space in the gal- 
leries was occupied by expectant men and women. When the Demo- 
crats realized this morning that all the Republicans were in town, they 
displayed evidence of a panic, and did their best to induce some Repub- 
licans not to vote. Ruger and Sittig were the uncertain quantities, 
neither the Republicans nor the Democrats knowing positively what 
they would do. Logan, Tree, Morrison, and " Josh " Allen, were on the 
floor when the joint session assembled. Ruger came into the House on 
the Republican side, and was nestled with Senator White and other Re- 
publicans who surrounded him. Every Senator and Representative 
was present — 51 Senators, and 153 Representatives. 

The call of the roll, for United States Senator, began amid an im- 
pressive silence. The Republicans began to vote right away. The 
Democrats did not respond on the first call. The final vote was as 
follows : John A. Logan, 103 ; L. Tree, 99 ; John C. Black, 2 ; J. Sco- 
field, 2; William R. Morrison, 11 ; J. A. Hoxie, 1. 



„ 6 5 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

Logan was declared Senator amid the wildest cheering. A committee 
was appointed to conduct him to the House, and, upon being intro- 
duced, he made a brief speech, saying, among other things : 

"In this contest, Mr. Speaker and Gentlemen, which has been an 
unusually close and heated one, I am proud to state that nothing has 
transpired to mar the friendly relations existing between myself and 
my worthy opponent. For thirty years this gentleman and myself have 
been friends, and I trust that we will always continue such. [Loud 
cheers.] I believe there never has been a contest between two persons 
waged more earnestly for their parties than this, and yet the mutual 
relations remain so pleasant. I respect Mr. Morrison politically and 
socially, and I am proud to say we are friends, and sincerely hope we 
may ever be friends. [Cheers.] As to the other gentleman who was 
my opponent for a time, I can say nothing against him, nor would I 
want to. Mr. Tree and myself lived neighbors for many years in Chicago, 
and I have always had the highest respect for him. He made as good 
a contest— coming late into the field, and being a little short of votes— 
as he could make. For him I have nothing but respect. 

" In conclusion, gentlemen, I desire to say that no matter what may 
have occurred during the contest, it has been carried on in a spirit of 
fairness. No such contest has ever been known in this country before, 
and it has appeared strange to me that there has been so little excite- 
ment and bitterness exhibited. It is remarkable, I say, in a contest 
which has lasted so long and been so close, that there is so little bitter- 
ness of feeling displayed ; and, I desire to say, that in representing the 
people of this State of Illinois in the United States Senate, I shall ever 
try to do that which seems to me to be my duty, representing my party 
and my constituents fairly and honestly. [Cheers.] I leave here, having 
no bitter feeling toward anyone who may have opposed me. I respect 
a man who will stand by his creeds and his friends, and I expect no 
more from others accorded to me. If I go to Washington, I do not go 
there with any fire burning in my bosom, or a feeling of antagonism to 
any party, or to the present Administration. I shall endeavor to repre- 
sent you fairly and honestly, and stand by you in all that which I be- 
lieve is right." 

PUBLIC INTEREST IN LOGAN'S VICTORY TELEGRAMS OF CON- 
GRATULATION, ETC. 

The day after Logan's great Senatorial victory most of 
the newspapers throughout the country made the despatches 
and their editorials referring to it, the main feature of their 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 367 

issues. Brief extracts only from one or two of them can be 
given — and these only as showing - the spirit of the victory. 
Said one of these newspaper despatches, dated Springfield, 
May 19th: 

There was no curbing the enthusiasm of the Republicans after the 
joint convention adjourned. A large number marched to the Leland, 
singing old army-songs ; others donned Logan badges, and went whoop- 
ing and yelling around the streets like mad. The Democrats kept 
aloof from the groups. They could not stand the good-humored chaff 
directed against them, and not a few were ashamed of their efforts to 
stampede the Republicans in favor of Farwell. 

About 3.30 o'clock, Representative Fuller mounted a chair in the 
rotunda of the Leland and read several hundred telegrams of con- 
gratulations which had poured in upon General Logan. All the de- 
spatches pointed out the National significance of the Republican vic- 
tory, and many breathed a spirited faith that Logan would be the 
party's candidate in 1888. Following are a few of the despatches : 

Washington, D. C, May 19th. — Thank God you were successful. 
Make my thanks to the friends, one and all, who have stood by you so 
nobly. Mary S. Logan. 

New York, May 19th. — Congratulations of the Irish-American Inde- 
pendents. E. A. Ford, President 

Philadelphia, Pa., May 19th. — Congratulations of the Clover Club. 

M. P. Handy. 

Washington, D. C, May 19th. — Accept my most cordial congratula- 
tions. The contest is unprecedented. Your victory is memorable. 

James G. Blaine. 

Washington, D. C, May 19th. — You won a National victory. Nobody 
rejoices more than W. W. Dudley. 

Washington, D. C, May 19th.— Congratulations. You have won for 
the National Republican Party another Donelson. You will follow it, 
in 1888, with another Appomattox. George Francis Dawson. 

Augusta, Me., May 19th.— The Republicans of Maine send hearty 
congratulations. Your election is a National victory, and means the 
future success of the party. S. H. Manley. 



368 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

Cincinnati, O., May 19th. — Accept congratulations of all Ohio 
Republicans because of your election. R. Foraker. 

Governor Martin, Topeka, wrote : " There is life in the old land 
yet. I heartily congratulate you on your magnificent triumph over the 
allied forces of Bourbon loggerheadism, free trade, and cash." Sena- 
tors Cullom, Miller, and Piatt telegraphed : " We congratulate you most 
heartily on your election to the Senate. You made a gallant fight and 
deserved success." John C. New, Indianapolis, telegraphed : " I con- 
gratulate you and the country on your reelection. Logan and victory 
are the standard for 1888." Senator Harrison, Indianapolis, wrote : 
" My most cordial congratulations upon your great victory. Indiana 
Republicans are shouting over it." Walter Evans, Louisville, wrote : 
" Accept my most cordial congratulations. A field so fought, so fol- 
lowed, and so fairly won, came not till now to dignify the times since 
Caesar's fortune." W. R. Leeds, President of the Republican Club in 
Philadelphia, wrote : " Accept the hearty congratulations of the 
Republicans of this Republican city, on the successful termination of 
your manly fight for right against wrong. The right is ever trium- 
phant." John Hay, New York, telegraphed : " I congratulate you on a 
splendid fight and a victory of the greatest National importance and 
value." Nelson W. Aldrich, Providence, telegraphed : " Accept my 
earnest congratulations on the success you have deserved and won." 
Others were from Robert R. Hall, Anson G. McCook, H. W. Young, 
Angus Cameron, Joseph O'Neil, William McKinley, Jr., Clark Carr, 
William Bross, Frank Hatton ; for Republican Clubs, Clem and P. E. 
Studebaker, of South Bend ; F. W. Palmer, of Chicago ; John B. Drake, 
Chancey I. Filley, Governor Rusk, H. A. Tabor, and C. B. Hayvvard. 

enthusiastic ovations from springfield to chicago 

logan's reception at Chicago. 

" The circumstances attending the journey of General 
Logan to Chicago, on Saturday last," said the Springfield 
Illinois State Jotir?tal of May 25, 1885, " and his reception 
there, were, in their way, as memorable as the remarkable 
campaign through which he had just passed, and the magnif- 
icent triumph by which it was crowned. Accompanied by a 
number of members of the Legislature, and other political 
and personal friends, General Logan left this city in a special 
car, tendered by Manager McMullin, by the noon train, for 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 369 

Chicago. Large crowds had collected at every important 
station en route, and the impromptu ovations extended to him 
at Lincoln, Atlanta, Bloomington, Lexington, Pontiac, Dwight, 
Wilmington, Joliet, and other points were of the most com- 
plimentary character and a reminder of the enthusiasm of the 
last campaign. Everywhere there was the utmost anxiety to 
see the hero of the memorable Senatorial campaign of 1885, 
and a spontaneous disposition to recognize him as the leader 
of the Republican Party in 1888." 

" On the return of Senator John A. Logan to this city, 
Saturday night," said the Chicago News of May 25th, "he 
was given a reception at the Grand Pacific Hotel, and there 
was a great outpouring in his honor. The Chicago Union 
Veteran Club, 250 strong, met the Senator and his escort 
. . . at the depot at 7.30 o'clock. A procession was 
formed and marched to the hotel, where the Senator was 
received with cheers, a salute of 103 guns also being fired 
on the lake-front. The hotel was crowded to its limit, and 
it was with great difficulty that the party edged their way 
through the blocked hallway. A reception committee was 
awaiting the Senator on the parlor floor, each wearing a 
badge inscribed ' One Hundred and Three, United Recep- 
tion Committee, May 23, General John A. Logan, Re-elected 
United States Senator, 1885. Our Leader for 1888/ . , . 
A little after eight o'clock Senator Logan and General H. 
H. Thomas entered the main parlor. This was the signal 
for a grand rush, and policemen and reception committee 
were powerless in trying to keep the crowd in line. Hand- 
shaking began, and nearly three thousand performed that 
act, a majority accompanying it with a word of congratula- 
tion. ... A set of resolutions passed by the Irish- 
American Central Club was presented. . . . Senator 
Logan replied : 

" ' I appreciate highly your kind and complimentary sentiments. In 
reference to this great gathering let me ask you not to take it as a 
24 



,y Q LIFE OF LOGAN. 

personal compliment to myself, but as an appreciation of the success 
of the people, now, and for the future. This is no triumph of my own, 
but of the Republican Party throughout the State. The contest just 
closed has excited not only the State, but aroused the keenest attention 
all over the country. Let me at this moment not go into details, about 
the combination of powers that has been at work to defeat the clearly 
expressed will and intentions of the people of this great common- 
wealth, but let me congratulate all that the Republican Party of this 
State to-day has unfurled its banner again, and again presents a united 
front to the enemy.' " 

BANQUET TO LOGAN BY THE CHICAGO UNION LEAGUE CLUB 

logan's modest speech. 

On Tuesday evening, May 26, 1885, General Logan sat 
down to a banquet in Chicago, given to him by the Union 
League Club of that city, in honor of the great Republican 
victory he had just gained in the Senatorial contest. Many 
distinguished persons were present. In his speech at that 
banquet he referred in the following modest and manly terms 
to that remarkable contest, and its still more remarkable re- 
sult: 

. . . It is not my purpose to enter into the history or details 
of our recent Senatorial contest. Neither shall I speak of the trials 
through which we passed, or the perils which were averted. Suffice it 
to say, that the victory was ours. [Applause.] To the steadfastness of our 
people and the integrity of the Republican Representatives in our Leg- 
islature is due the credit for our success. [Applause.] I wish to dis- 
claim the idea that the gatherings of the people at the various towns 
and villages along the road from Springfield to Chicago, and the grand 
reception tendered by the people the night of my arrival here, or this 
banquet itself, are considered by me as intended to be personally com- 
plimentary to myself. They are recognitions of the principles, under- 
lying the Republican Party, for which this contest was made. [Ap- 
plause.] A contest for a seat in the United States Senate has seldom 
caused much popular solicitude ; but the protracted controversy, the 
fact that the parties were equally divided, and the loss of members of 
the Legislature by death— all conspired to bring the contest promi- 
nently to the notice of the people throughout the United States. That 
the opponents of the Republican Party had become, at this early day, 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 37 1 

tired of the management of National affairs in the hands of their own 
friends, is shown by the fact that they actually stayed away from the 
polls in the Thirty-fourth Senatorial District [Laughter and applause], 
thus giving us a majority, so that a Republican might again be chosen 
to represent the State of Illinois in the United States Senate. [Ap- 
plause.] This has caused the Republicans throughout the country to 
discover the turn of the tide in favor of Republican principles, and the 
hearts of all true patriots to leap with joy. [Applause.] To the en- 
ergy and fidelity of the Republicans of that district are we indebted for 
this result. [Applause.] 

And then, after describing in glowing terms the wonder- 
ful resources of Illinois, in population, agriculture, mineral, 
manufacturing, and other wealth — as well as the beauty, and 
marvellous growth, energy, and prosperity of her chief city 
— he added : 

Why should a man not feel a pardonable pride in having been se- 
lected as a representative of such a State, against combinations of pat- 
ronage and money, without the influence or use by himself of either? 
The people of this, my native State, have been more than kind to me in 
the past. Whether I shall be able to fill the full measure of my public 
duty, my future must disclose. I can only promise that I shall in all 
things try to be faithful to their great interest, and do no act that shall 
cause them to regret the choice they have just made. [Applause.] 

logan's presidential "boom" for 1888, starting strongly. 

While General Logan was taking a brief rest at Chicago, 
after his exhausting contest, the newspapers throughout the 
land were also felicitating him upon his wonderful victory. 
Many, like the Lincoln (Neb.) Journal, said " Had Logan 
been at the head of the ticket last year, there would have been 
a Republican President now," — or words to a like effect. Hun- 
dreds of them proclaimed him as the next Republican candi- 
date for the Presidential office ; and many placed the name 
of John A. Logan of Illinois at the head of their columns as 
their choice for nomination to that exalted office, in 1888. 
Cannon-salutes and other rejoicings were had in many parts 
of the country including staid New England, and the Middle 



372 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



States, as well as those of the West. The Staunton Valley 
Virgi7iian well said : " The result sent a thrill of joy to Re- 
publicans throughout the length and breadth of the land. 
It was announced by the boom of cannon, the display of fire- 
works and bunting, and a wild rejoicing that demonstrated 
how strong a hold the brave true man has upon his party 
friends. And this, not because of the great personal triumph, 
but for the reason that the cause he represents will have still 
the services of one of its ablest and most intrepid advocates 
and defenders on the floor of the Senate, for six years longer, 
unless he should be called to higher honors." And the com- 
pliments were not uttered by Republican papers only, but by 
independent and Democratic journals also, as, for instance, 
by the New York Sun, which after tendering its " compli- 
ments " to the General, added : " It has been a hard fight 
and Logan has won it by superior generalship " ; and the 
New York Post, which declared that: " If General Logan's 
popularity was on the wane, as his enemies affirm, before the 
Presidential election, these events were amply sufficient to 
revive and widen it, even among his party antagonists" ; and 
" Brick Pomeroy's " Democrat, which said : " The most 
memorable political event of the season is the election of 
General John A. Logan to the United States Senate as his own 
successor. The coming of a cyclone through from the West 
to the Potomac would not have made more of a stir." No 
wonder the Cincinnati Commercial- Gazette admitted — as so 
many other journals, in substance, also declared, — that 
Logan's unprecedented victory "brings forward the gallant 
old General himself as a possible Presidential figure in 1888." 

his return to washington — salute of one hundred guns 
in honor of logan's re-election. 

When the news reached Washington that Logan had 
been re-elected to the United States Senate, a midnight can- 
non-salute of thirty-eight guns was fired at the White House 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 373 

lot by some of his jubilant friends, which awoke the Demo- 
cratic President — and all the city for that matter — and doubt- 
less set him thinking about what might happen in 1888. 
Subsequently a salute of one hundred guns was also fired in 
honor of Logan from the Virginia shore opposite the city of 
Washington — where the General, upon his arrival, was 
warmly received by the Invincible Club of East Washington, 
and other Republicans of the city. 

LOGAN VISITS GRANTS SICK-CHAMBER OLD WAR-MEMORIES 

REVIVED. 

It was in the middle of June, 1885, only two days prior 
to the suffering chieftain's removal to Mount McGregor, that 
Logan made a special visit to General Grant at the latter's 
residence in New York City. Grant was greatly pleased that 
Logan had come, and although the former was restricted, by 
the nature of the cruel disease that was eating out his life, 
from doing much talking, yet they managed to spend several 
hours together recalling old memories of the war — General 
Logan taking luncheon with the family down-stairs and after- 
ward coming up again. It was the last extended interview 
Grant had with any of his old friends, and was throughout 
of a very pleasant character, as Logan afterward told the 
writer. Grant was still able to talk, at this time, though with 
difficulty. During this protracted and interesting visit Gen- 
eral Grant showed to General Logan certain passages of the 
" Personal Memoirs " he was then engaged in writing, where- 
in he had referred, at greater or less length, to the services 
which Logan himself had rendered during the war — some in 
proof-sheets and others in manuscript. When Logan's visit 
ended, with a kindly adieu and warm pressure of the hand, 
he then for the last time on earth saw the friendly eyes and 
heard the loved voice of his old commander, who so soon 
afterward, like the great Hebrew leader, went up to the 
mountain-top to die. 



374 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



LOGAN S ENTHUSIASTIC RECEPTION AT THE G. A. R. ENCAMPMENT, 
PORTLAND, ME. HIS TELLING SPEECHES THERE. 

Toward the end of June, 1885, the city of Portland, Me., 
was treated to the sight of an encampment upon its borders 
— of more than two thousand tents, fairly crowded with some 
twenty-five thousand veterans of the G. A. R. — and to all 
the excitement and bustle and beauty of military pageantry 
which the G. A. R. reunions always bring in their train. 
Logan of course was there, and watched the martial array 
as for three long hours it marched, in solid ranks, past the 
reviewing-stand. A newspaper report of the Tuesday's glori- 
ous pageant said : 

The enthusiasm for Logan was simply boundless. Sometimes there 
would be a little hiatus where the Down East men were not familiar 
with the face of the great volunteer chieftain. Then would come 
marching along some man who had served under "Blackjack," and 
he would start a cheer that would roll along for minutes. Everybody 
wanted to see Logan, and after the Posts were dismissed the comrades 
came streaming back, and crowded around the reviewing-stand by 
thousands to study the hero of the citizen-soldiery of the Great Repub- 
lic. They thronged the space to such an extent that Dahlgren Post had 
to be called back to open up a line of march, which it did with tact and 
skill. 

On the same evening, at the City Hall, during the recep- 
tion to the commander-in-chief, Logan, as usual, had to 
speak, and the journals of the day mentioned that he "came 
forward amidst the most tremendous applause," and that 
"the house fairly rang with enthusiastic cheers, which were 
repeated again and again." When, at last, the audience 
quieted down, the General said : 

Mr. Commander, Comrades, Ladies and Gentlemen : While we are 
assembled here to-night in this beautiful city, surrounded as we are by 
friends who meet us cheerily and greet us kindly, we can but allow 
our minds to wander away from here, momentarily at least, to where the 
old commander, grander than all, suffers with a disease that has brought 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 375 

him to the very verge of the grave. In my judgment time has not given 
to any people a grander commander of men, a greater director of forces, 
or a more magnificent campaigner [applause] ; a man with more ability 
to execute than U. S. Grant. [Applause.] For this country he has done 
as much as any man that ever lived has done for any other country. 
[Great applause.] No matter what may have been said, no matter how 
much aspersed by those who despised, he has passed up and beyond 
all the clouds that have surrounded him, and his character shines out 
to-day before the civilized world as bright as the brightest star that 
decks the heavens. [Applause.] 

I believe there is not a citizen in the United States of America who 
does not sympathize with his misfortune and suffering now, and it is the 
prayer of the G. A. R., I am sure, that God, who disposes all things, may 
permit this grand old man to live on as one of the citizens of this Re- 
public. For him I can say no more than that when he passes away, this 
country and civilization will lose one of the greatest supporters of lib- 
erty that ever lived, and one of the grandest citizens that ever died. 

Comrades, we have met again according to the forms of our organi- 
zation, an association based upon Fraternity, Charity, and Loyalty; 
fraternity that lives and is worth recognition, which has been blistered 
in the fire of battle. It is that character of fraternity which shines out 
like the brightest s:em from the mines of Golconda. 

It is a fraternity not to be broken. It is as fixed as the stars. It is 
as strong as if held together by hooks of steel. It is that character of 
fraternity not in name, but which lives and wells up in the heart, and 
which would to-night go far, travel long, in darkness and in light, in 
sunshine and in storm, to stand by the side of, and aid and assist in 
all proper ways, that comrade who touched elbows in the time when 
shot and shell rained like hail from the clouds above. [Applause.] 
The charity that belongs to our organization is that heaven-descended 
charity, whose heights have not been taken, and whose depths cannot be 
fathomed. It is the charity with no bounds to its land and no surveys 
to its seas. It is the charity that stands ready at all times to snatch 
the body of the poor from the potter's-field and inter it where at the 
head shall be marked, " He fell fighting for his country." 

It is that charity which hears the wail of the widow of a comrade. It 
is that charity which hears the cry of the orphan ; that aids and assists 
the sufferer. It is that charity which pledges one comrade to another 
that the poor-house shall not be the dwelling-place of a comrade ; that 
he shall stand before the world a proud American citizen ; having fought 
and preserved the Stars and Stripes, beneath its folds he shall not be 
disgraced. [Tremendous applause.] It is that charity which collects 



37$ 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



not for the benefit of those who can protect themselves, but for those 
who need help ; and which pledges itself that when a grand, great 
Government like this allows a poor man who suffered for its existence 
to creep along and beg for food, comrades will step in and supply that 
want. 

The loyalty upon which this great organization is based is not loy- 
alty that shrinks before the Stars and Stripes. 

It is not the loyalty that begs pardon and makes excuses for having 
at least tried to save this Union. [Applause.] It is not the loyalty 
wherever found on land or sea that fails to recognize its flag ; that fails 
to recognize the laws ; that fails to recognize the duty of a citizen, or 
that will deny being a citizen of this grand Republic and not glorify in 
having participated in its preservation. [Applause.] It is the loyalty 
that lives in the heart and swears by the God that rules this world that 
at all times they are ready again to take hold of the banner whenever 
our country may be in danger, if that time should ever come. God for- 
bid that it shall. [Applause.] It is the loyalty that believes in patriot- 
ism, that this Government is a nation, and that those who saved it at 
least are as good as those who tried to destroy it. It is the loyalty 
which is taught to the child on its mother's lap and makes it hang out 
the banner and say "My father was a Union soldier." [Long-con- 
tinued applause.] It is the loyalty which will live in the hearts of the 
American people and will make future generations so strong, so proud, 
and so determined, that all the nations of the earth combined and with 
the best commander living and with all the earth's treasury could not 
penetrate even the border of this great Republic. My comrades, I be- 
lieve in this organization. I say here and now that every soldier within 
the confines of this Republic ought to belong to it. [Applause.] He 
ought to be within it, and proud of his comradeship. It cannot do any 
man harm ; it will do every man good. Let each and every one enjoy 
these benefits which are to be enjoyed within this organization. 

Let each and every one participate in all its benefits. Let him, if 
poor and needy claim its charity ; let his family, if he has one, have the 
same right to its charity that others have. It is for such purposes, and 
means what it says — Fraternity, Charity, and Loyalty. 

On the following day, when General Logan attended 
the business meeting- of the G. A. R., the " boys in blue " 
insisted upon having another speech from him — and al- 
though, despite the " tremendous outburst of cheers and ap- 
plause," he protested against speech-making at a business ses- 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 377 

sion, he at last yielded to their enthusiastic persistence and 
made another brief speech. In it was the following pathetic 
passage, which, now that the illustrious speaker himself has 
gone from our midst, will be read and reread with both in- 
terest and profit by the old soldiers who have survived him. 
It ran thus. Said he : 

There is only one thing that I desire to say. It is this, and always 
when I think of it, it brings to my memory sad reflections. You and I, 
all of us, are moving along with time on the downward road to eternity. 
We are growing old instead of young, and we often see the silvered hair 
that we used to see only occasionally in the line. The heads of nearly 
all are becoming whitened. A few more years and the Grand Army of 
the Republic will only be known as one of the things that are past/ So, 
while we live, let us live so that when we die future generations shall 
remember that we lived a life of honor and patriotism, and defended the 
best Republic that God ever created. [Applause.] 

Again, at the Woman's Relief Corps Reception, at the 
City Hall, that evening, the enthusiastic audience forced him 
to speak once more ; and he eloquently said : 

When it is expected that men can accomplish much without the as- 
sistance of the women a great mistake is made ; and especially in what- 
ever tends to civilize and Christianize mankind is always seen the 
hands of the women of the land. [Applause.] That which they have 
done for the Grand Army sufferers is much, and we are sincerely, in- 
tensely grateful to them for their services. Not a soldier who is within 
the sound of my voice fails to remember, if ever he was a sufferer with 
a burning fever, if ever he was prostrated by an enemy's shot, if ever he 
was on the couch of a hospital, that when the soft hand of a woman was 
placed on his parched brow, it felt as if an angel of God had been sent 
to his couch as a ministering angel. [Applause.] I heard the name of 
old Mother Bickerdyke. I know her well. I have seen her with my 
own eyes helping wounded soldiers from the field when shot and shell 
were raining around her. And when I speak of her, I speak of her as 
typifying the woman who helped the soldier in the war. Tall and mus- 
cular, she would take a wounded boy in her arms and carry him to the 
hospital. Why, ladies and gentlemen, I can speak from experience. I 
was once a sufferer on a battle-field, and long afterward, and every 
morn I felt as if a silver cord were twined around a capstan in the re- 
gions of glory and reached to my heart, where it was anchored by the 



$7% LIFE OF LOGAN. 

hand of woman. [Cheers.] Why, gentlemen, their hands are so con- 
nected with the hand of divinity that man without them would be a bar- 
barian. And to the Grand Army let me say, let the time never come 
when you will contemplate the separation of the Relief Corps from the 
Grand Army. Man is cruel, or if not cruel he is rough, but woman is 
gentle ; and as the poor old soldier goes tottering down the road of life 
to meet death, nothing can cheer him on as can the ministrations of 
woman in charity. So does the widow of the soldier who has gone be- 
fore, need the consoling influence that woman alone can give. And I 
thank God, as a member of the Grand Army, that He has brought to 
the front this auxiliary. I thank God there was mind enough, charity 
enough, generosity enough to bring into existence the Woman's Relief 
Corps. For myself I feel so strongly the intelligent work you have 
done that I cannot thank you strongly enough, and I am grateful for 
the opportunity of saying these words to express my gratitude. [Ap- 
plause.] 

the logan banquet in boston a characteristic incident 

— logan's vigorous speech on "civil service reform" 
and " offensive partisanship "■ — ■" fair play " demanded. 

On the evening of June 29, 1885, General Logan, having 
arrived in Boston from Portland, Me., that afternoon, was 
banqueted at the Parker House by the Norfolk Club. A 
Boston correspondent of the New York Tribune said : 
" The railway station was crowded with admirers of the Illi- 
nois Senator, who cheered him lustily when he stepped 
from the car, where he was met by a committee of the club 
and taken to the Parker House. As the carriage was leav- 
ing the station a poorly dressed man standing on the side- 
walk opposite caught General Logan's eye and instantly 
raised his hat. General Logan, with characteristic courtesy, 
recognized the greeting by completely uncovering his head 
and bowing, as if to a distinguished assemblage, instead of to 
one humble person. This little act was the signal for three 
more cheers, which echoed in the ears of the visitor, as he 
was driven away in the direction of the Parker House. From 
5 to 6 p.m. General Logan received visitors in the parlors of 
the Parker House, where about two hundred and fifty promi- 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 379 

nent men were presented to him and his wife, whose presence 
was requested in the reception-room. . . . Soon after 
seven o'clock the company entered the dining-room. The 
president of the club, Asa French, one of the Commissioners 
of Alabama Claims, presided, with General Logan on his 
right and Governor Robinson on his left. After excellent 
speeches by the presiding officer and Governor Robinson, 
Senator Loofan was introduced. 

General Logan, on rising to respond to the flattering in- 
troduction of the chairman, was received with cheer after 
cheer, and two or there minutes elapsed before he could be 
heard. He began by making some complimentary allusions 
to Massachusetts ; he referred to some of the eminent men 
of the Old Bay State, spoke of the remarkable change in 
public sentiment on some important questions in the last 
thirty years, and then passed on to a consideration of some 
phases of the present political situation. He said : 

First, let me say of Civil Service Reform, that it is the child of 
the Republican Party, but unfortunately has been put out to nurse 
with a stranger, and, if not dead now, looks "sick unto death." 
When the law was passed, the intention was to put into the positions to 
which the law applied, such persons as were found to be best quali- 
fied to perform the duties required, and also to retain in position such 
persons as were qualified and found to have faithfully performed their 
duties. The law is now construed, however, to the effect that a person 
who voted the Republican ticket at the last election committed a crime 
against " the peace and dignity " of the Democratic Party, a new offence, 
heretofore unknown to law, or politics, to wit: "offensive partisan- 
ship." A man may have rebelled, or, being in the North, may have 
sympathized with rebellion against the Government. He may have 
sought to negotiate with foreign powers for its overthrow. He may 
have striven to hamstring it at the most critical moment of its desperate 
struggle for existence. He may have attempted to destroy its benef- 
icent influence. He may have tried to make our institutions a by- 
word and a mockery among the nations. He may have terrorized 
voters. He may have suppressed or destroyed the ballot, or fraudu- 
lently perverted its true intent and meaning. He may have assisted 
in enacting laws under whose free operation freedom became a delu- 



; So LIFE OF LOGAN. 



o 



sion and personal liberty a snare. But these do not seem to prove 
him to be an "offensive partisan"; provided always that he voted 
the Democratic ticket. Shall a man who has been true, even at the 
risk of life, limb, health, and fortune, to the Union, to freedom, to the 
sanctity of the ballot, and to that spirit of progress which is acceptable 
in the sight of God, be amenable to the charge of "offensive partisan- 
ship " fur exercising his right as an American citizen ? Is this the 
character of the man who is offensive to the Democratic Party ? Do 
we not see the Civil Service principles twisted, warped, and most wretch- 
edly deformed, in place of the service being, as was promised, re- 
formed ? I object, for one, to the prostitution of the public service in 
the name of reform. I insist that there should be candor and fair deal- 
ing in the matter of making removals from office. If our political op- 
ponents propose to make removals from all the offices, I say, instead of 
trumping up frivolous and unjust charges against Republican incum- 
bents as a justification for their removal, that they shall announce that 
they are to be turned out because they are Republicans, and their suc- 
cessors are to be appointed because they are Democrats. Sir, tear away 
the mask of reform and let the face of Democracy come forth. 

During the canvass of last year our opponents demanded that the ras- 
cals should be turned out ; and insisted on examining the books and 
counting the money. They have counted the money which was col- 
lected and cared for by the Republican Party, and have found it all 
there except two obstinate pennies that seemed bent upon proving our 
rascality until they themselves were found out. The Republican Party 
has had undisputed leadership for the last twenty-four years. The 
wisdom of its laws and the fidelity of its administration are attested by 
the splendid material and social development of the people, by our un- 
exampled progress as a nation, and by the advanced position of in- 
fluence our Government has taken with the nations of the world. The 
principles and policies announced and maintained in its record of 
splendid achievement have challenged the admiration of the foremost 
men of the entire world. Such a party must lead ; it cannot follow. 
Such a party deserves and must again achieve success. I have no fears 
for the future of the Republican Party. Its principles, knocking at the 
door of the conscience of the people, will regain admission. The spirit 
of fair play which fills the heart of the great body of the American people 
will demand in such tones as cannot be refused that every citizen under 
the flag shall be protected in the right of free speech and a free ballot. 

Mr. Chairman : The Republican Party is not dead ; it lives the life of 
the vigorous and strong. It will be returned to power by the people. 
It is the party of the people. Protection to our home free labor de- 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 381 

mands it ; the restoration of true Civil Service Reform demands it ; ad- 
equate appropriations to aid the system of free schools wherever needed 
demand it ; the promoting of our home industrial interests in all proper 
ways demands it. The necessity for the enforcement of the right of 
every voter within our National boundaries to cast his ballot and have 
the same fairly counted at the National elections, and to give to each 
man that equal and adequate protection before the law to which he is 
entitled, requires the return of the Republicans to power, both in Con- 
gress and in the Executive branch of the Government, in order that 
the financial system established by the Republican Party may be pre- 
served, that the revenues of the country may be protected against un- 
warranted claims upon the Treasury. 

Alluding to this memorable banquet, the Boston corre- 
spondent of the New York Herald (Ind.) telegraphed: 
"The visit of General Logan has been the chief social and 
political event of the week. The dinner on Monday night 
was a very elaborate affair, and the faithful came from all 
quarters of the State to partake of it and listen to the 
speeches. Many had never seen General Logan. His 
speech drew forth plenty of applause, and although he is by- 
no means the finished orator that Governor Robinson or 
Congressman Long is, he made an excellent impression." 
And the Washington Evening Star (Ind.) of July 6th, allud- 
ing to it, and to Logan as one of the two leading Presi- 
dential candidates, said : " We have seen Massachusetts, 
which hitherto has not been demonstrative over ' Black 
Jack,' exceed herself in warmth of welcome for him." 

logan's fourth of july oration at Woodstock, conn., 

1885. 

On the Fourth of July, 1885, in Roseland Park, near Wood- 
stock, Conn., by the shore of Lake Wabbaquasset, beneath a 
canvas awning which covered the speaking-stand, around 
which many thousands of Grangers and others had assembled, 
" under the shadow of a hillock on which John Elliott is said 
to have preached to the Indians," General Logan, amid the 



3 g 2 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

cheers of those assembled, stepped to the front and his voice 
rang out, bugle-like, in these eloquent and patriotic words : 

As I look at the features of the natural panorama spread out before 
me, I feel that no words can equal with their eloquence the beauty of 
the scene before me. Like that of a midnight dream, the silver ripples 
of the lake, the shade of historic elms, the slopes formed by nature's 
touch and beautified by man's skill are more than mortal words can 
express. In this garden of patriotic devotion it is most fitting that we 
should meet to learn the most appropriate mode of celebrating the 
nation's natal day, how the jewel of Liberty must be kept in the family 
of freedom, how to rear the monument of devotion to our country. 
Centuries ago, runs a legend, in the older world of Asia, there lived 
an Indian prince in oriental splendor and magnificence. He loved a 
maiden, beautiful and pure, and brought her to his palace as his royal 
bride. As time passed by, his love for her only grew the stronger, and 
for her gratification he builded palaces and founded cities. That her 
brightest hopes and fondest anticipations might be fully realized he 
builded at last a palace grander than all, of the finest material, orna- 
mented with the brightest and purest gems, where he could worship 
at the shrine of her he so loved. Its delicately beautiful architecture 
was the marvel of all men. Just as the vision of its splendor burst 
upon her, the forbidding shadow of Azrael swept across her path, and 
the potentate, bowed down in grief at the loss of her whom he had 
all too fondly cherished, dedicated to her, as her abode in death, that 
matchlessly beautiful palace in which he had fondly hoped to see her 
live. 

Little over a century has passed, since, in the younger world of 
America, a palace more majestic and beautiful even than this, with 
equal care, and with even more lavish expenditure of blood and treas- 
ure, was reared by our sovereigns, for the abode of that which above 
all earthly tilings they loved the best, and delighted the most to honor 
— a palace in which its builders, our forefathers, fondly hoped that 
Liberty might dwell forever. One hundred and nine years ago this 
very day they commenced the work by declaring to the world that ' all 
men are created equal.' Upon this rock they founded the palace- 
temple of the new Republic. But in its erection the builders of this 
wondrous edifice failed to complete it in full accord with their great 
design, and though the pillars rose in stately majesty, and architrave 
and cornice were both massive and exquisitely beautiful, while its pro- 
portions and their mutual adjustment were in all respects satisfying, 
and while the interior was adorned most lavishly with all the most 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 383 

valued jewels of an advanced Christian civilization ; yet the great 
jewel of the capstone has never yet been firmly set — that great jewel, 
the grandest of them all — in looking through whose dazzling scintilla- 
tions deep down in its heart you shall see graven by the indelible 
graver of God himself, the words : "Liberty to man, and perfect 
equality before the law." 

The question of firmly setting that great jewel permanently in its 
place, and thus completing the marvellous structure, has been decided 
by a most sanguinary conflict between those in favor of it on the one side 
and those opposed to it on the other. The result of that dread struggle 
is known to all the peoples of the world, and the fiat has gone forth 
that the sacred capstone jewel of this temple shall be set, so that 
Liberty may within it find a safe abiding-place, and not a final resting- 
place in death. 

But while some of us insist upon setting this priceless jewel per- 
manently at once, there are others who object, and who by fraud have 
substituted an imitation in place of that which all intelligent and 
thoughtful people recognize as the real gem. My countrymen, shall 
we have the pure gem, the precious stone that your blood was shed to 
secure, or the imitation only? The pure gem can only be secured by 
every man's rights being fully protected. The people can do this — 
your representatives cannot, without the force of the people behind 
them. So then let the force of the people be felt in support of what we 
mean when we speak of the jewel of "Liberty and equality before the 
law." 

It is true we are now under a Government and system of political 
institutions the theory of which is better calculated to serve the ends 
of civil and religious liberty than any of which former history makes 
mention. But we must reduce that theory to practice. We are singu- 
larly fortunate in many respects. We are now safe from the assaults of 
any and all outside foes. All the armies of Europe, led by the best com- 
manders ever known, backed by all the treasure on earth, could not 
penetrate beyond our borders to our interior. Whatever danger there 
may be for us in the future is within ourselves. Should destruction 
ever befall this land, in our own hands will the vials of calamity be 
borne ; and may I not ask the question here and now, Is there not 
danger, and great danger ? Can w r e not see "whence it approaches ?" 
We surely can see the increasing disregard for law which now pervades 
our country ; the growing disposition to substitute the personal will for 
law ; the individual judgment for the judgment of the courts ; one's own 
wishes for the solemnly expressed will of the people. To deny this is to 
deny truth and insult popular intelligence. To admit it is to recognize 



384 LIFE 0F LOGAN. 

the point from whence our great danger may be expected, and the ne- 
cessity for steps to avert it. 

Let us then, each and every one who claims to be a lover of Repub- 
lican institutions, and especially of Republican liberty, as well as a 
guardian and well-wisher of coming generations, pledge ourselves, by 
the blood which has flowed like water for the preservation of this great 
Republic, that within its bounds the violation of its laws must cease ; 
that we will not only ourselves obey those laws, but will refuse to toler- 
ate disobedience in others. Let none forget that to disregard the law 
is to trample underfoot all the sacrifices that have been made for 
Liberty. In the words of one whose very life was sacrificed in that 
cause : " Let reverence of the law be breathed by every mother to the 
lisping babe that prattles on her lap ; let it be taught in the schools, 
seminaries, and colleges ; let it be written in primers, spelling-books, 
and almanacs; let it be preached from pulpits, and proclaimed in 
legislative halls, and enforced in courts of justice ; in short, let it be- 
come the political religion of the Nation." Yea, let these words of 
wisdom, appealing to us from the very tomb of the sainted Lincoln, 
'•'ring out through all the land, and to all the inhabitants thereof," 
awakening in our people a fixed determination that soon, very soon, 
the time shall come when " reverence of the law " shall be the creed of 
all political parties. When that time shall come — as come it must — 
which shall see faithfully executed the declaration that all citizens of 
the United States shall be regarded as equally entitled to the same 
rights and privileges now contemplated by law ; when men of all shades 
and colors who under the law are entitled shall be permitted to have 
their voices heard and their ballots counted in the selection of the 
persons to control the Government of the Nation and the States ; when 
intimidation shall cease ; when frauds, coming from whence they may, 
in misdirecting and miscounting the ballots, and controlling elections 
unlawfully, shall be punished ; when ballot-box stuffers shall find 
homes in penitentiaries ; when the black man as well as the white man 
shall be permitted to exercise his legal rights without fear or molesta- 
tion ; when he shall have equal rights with the whites in all the courts 
of justice ; when he shall have equal privileges afforded him in secur- 
ing an education ; when he shall not only be counted in the apportion- 
ment for representation in Congress and in the Electoral College, but 
shall also be permitted to freely aid in the selection of that represen- 
tation; in a word, when all citizens are equal and unobstructed while 
participating in the affairs and management of this great Nation — then 
and not till then will the real gem of " Liberty and equality before the 
law " be permanently fixed as the finishing capstone and crown of the 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 385 

sacred temple reared by our fathers and perfected by ourselves, within 
whose dazzling portals Liberty shall live with us forever, and Heaven 
benignly smile upon "a Government of the people, by the people, and 
for the people." 

LOGAN ON GRANT ADDRESS TO THE G. A. R. IN THE M. E. 

MEMORIAL CHURCH, WASHINGTON ELOQUENT REVIEW OF THE 

SERVICES OF THAT GREAT CHIEFTAIN. 

On October 1, 1885, soon after the death, at Mount 
McGregor, of his old commander, as a part of the memorial 
services held in the Metropolitan M. E. Church, Washington, 
by the Grand Army, General Logan delivered the following 
address, critically reviewing the great services of General 
Grant, and eloquently eulogizing the extraordinary military- 
genius and general character of that great and commanding 
figure in American history : 

Ladies and Gentlemen: Of General U. S. Grant's early history t 
am not prepared to speak. Of it I know nothing. Until June, i86r, 
he was a stranger to me and I to him. I then met him in Springfield^ 
the capital of the State of Illinois. Sumter had fallen, and the first 
flush of victory had inspired the rebels with audacity and daring. The 
President of the United States had called upon the Governors of the 
States for volunteers, with whom to march against armed rebellion, in 
order that the honor of the Union might be maintained and popular 
government perpetuated for the benefit of the present and. coming 
generations. This appeal had met in the North with such an outpour- 
ing of loyal men in behalf of the country that the fires of patriotism 
were rekindled, and burned so brightly upon the mountain-top, on the 
prairies, and in the vales that, like the rushing flames in fired stubble, 
they swept everything before them. When I met Grant he was assist- 
ing the Governor of my own State in organizing her patriotic sons, who 
were flocking to the Union standard that they might be led against the 
enemy. It was at this time that the Twenty-first Illinois was organized 
from troops who had enlisted for three months, but had not passed 
beyond the borders of the State. They were hesitating as to their re- 
enlistment. All of them being from the southern part of the State, 
where I then resided, and with the most of whom I was acquainted, I 
was invited to go to their camp and address them, with the view of in- 
25 



3 36 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



ducing them to re-enlist. I did go, and made to them a speech as best 
I could, describing the soldiers who would see service and 

WEAR SCARS OF BATTLE 

upon their persons, and those who remained near their own homes, 
where no danger awaited them. Other addresses were made. Grant 
listened, but spoke not. The regiment re-enlisted, and he was then and 
there made its colonel. This was the starting point of his wonder- 
ful military career. From this time, while Grant lived, we were close 
friends. Grant took command of his regiment and marched, under or- 
ders, into Missouri. He was soon thereafter made brigadier-general, 
ranking from the 17th day of May. During this time I was engaged in 
raising a regiment which was numbered the Thirty-first Illinois In- 
fantry. 

Under orders, I was sent to Cairo, 111., where my regiment formed a 
part of a brigade that became a portion of Grant's first important com- 
mand. Cairo was now his headquarters, where he employed all his time 
and energy in organizing and disciplining his troops. Wooden steam- 
boats were converted into iron-clads, for offensive and defensive purposes. 
The sound of riveting the iron sheets, and the ringing of the hammer on 
the anvil, and the light of the forge, could be seen and heard both by day 
and night, in grand preparation for "grim-visaged war." On the 7th 
day of November, 1861, Grant fought the battle of Belmont, where he 
achieved a great victory against fearful odds. In February following he 
moved up the Tennessee River and, in connection with the gun-boats 
under command of Commodore Foote, advanced upon and attacked 
Fort Henry, which fell into his hands. He at once moved forward 

AGAINST FORT DONELSON, 

where the unconditional surrender of the enemy's army of 15,000 men, 
65 pieces of artillery, 17,600 small-arms, with enormous military sup- 
plies, gave Grant a great name as a military genius throughout the 
land and started him on his road to future glory. It was the demand 
made by him on the commander of that stronghold for an unconditional 
surrender that gained for him the cognomen of " Unconditional Sur- 
render Grant," by which he was afterward usually designated and known 
to all officers and soldiers, as well as citizens, throughout the war of the 
great rebellion. 

After this great achievement and his promotion to major-general, 
by the jealousy and littleness of his superior officer, who commanded 
the department at that time, General Halleck, Grant was held at Fort 
Henry, the next thing to an absolute prisoner. It was understood in 
many quarters at this time that General Grant contemplated sending 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 387 

his resignation to the President. The enemy, however, under Generals 
Albert Sydney Johnston, Beauregard, and others, having concentrated 
all the force they could collect in the West at the strategic point of 
Corinth, Miss., in order to meet the contemplated advance of the Army 
of the Tennessee, now located at three points, Pittsburg, Savannah, and 
Crump's Landing, on the banks of the Tennessee River, he was per- 
mitted again to take command of it. The forces of the army at that 
time numbered not more than twenty-three thousand men. On the 6th 
of April, at Pittsburg Landing, his army was assaulted by the rebel 
forces under Johnston, estimated at over fifty thousand men. The bat- 
tle raged on all parts of the field from early morn till darkness closed in 
over the scene. When the battle closed on that evening the enemy 
were 

IN POSSESSION OF ALL OUR CAMPS. 

Both sides were, however, very much demoralized. During the night, 
General Lew Wallace, with 7,000 men, arrived on the field, from 
Crump's Landing ; also the Army of the Centre, commanded by Buell, 
with 20,000 men, crossed the Tennessee River, so as to be ready for 
action the next day. Grant had his line readjusted that night, and 
everything in position for an early advance, which he had ordered for 
the next morning. Johnston, the commander of the rebel army, had 
fallen on the battle-field, on the 6th. Beauregard was now in chief com- 
mand. On the morning of the 7th, at early dawn, our forces moved for- 
ward to the contest. The battle began, and raged fiercely, the advan- 
tage through the day being somewhat in our favor until about four 
o'clock in the afternoon, when Grant in person led his hosts in a gallant 
charge, recapturing our old camp and driving the enemy pell-mell from 
the field. The enemy were in full retreat upon Corinth. Our army 
was filled with joy, and with shouts of triumph and victory bore the old 
starry banner of the Republic once more to the front. 

General Halleck now came to Pittsburg Landing and took com- 
mand of the army, placing Grant in a position unassigned, where he had 
no command whatever. Halleck's jealousy of Grant was so strongly ex- 
hibited that it was noticeable by all. 

Grant was not even asked for suggestions or consulted as to any 
movements to be made. His soldierly qualities under these circum- 
stances were sorely tried. In fact, he was under a cloud ; no one could 
exactly explain or understand why. He again 

CONTEMPLATED SENDING HIS RESIGNATION, 

but after coolly and quietly considering the matter, his better judgment 
prevailed. We now, under command of General Halleck, commonly 



38S LIFE OF LOGAN. 

known in the army as "Old Brains," moved upon Corinth by a succes- 
sion of intrenched and fortified approaches, but so quietly and slowly 
that our forces continued to augment until we had finally grown to be 
an army of over one hundred thousand men. The enemy was estimated 
at about the same number. 

The advice to our commander to attack the enemy either on his left 
or right flank was unheeded. The information given Grant, and by him 
to the commanding officer, that the enemy were evacuating their posi- 
tion, was laughed at by Halleck. I had myself become so thoroughly 
satisfied, from information I could not doubt, that Beauregard was with- 
drawing his whole force and eluding Halleck, that I asked permission to 
move forward with my command, which at that time was one division. 
Finally, when Beauregard withdrew from the front of Halleck, it was 
done so quietly that when Corinth was entered there was hardly a trace 
of the enemy left. Halleck was soon thereafter ordered to the East, 
and General Grant again placed in command of the Army of the Ten- 
nessee. But his forces were so 

SCATTERED UP AND DOWN RAILROADS 

and at different points, by the dispositions made by the commanding 
general of the department prior to his leaving, that his army amounted 
to a very small force at any one point. Soon Buell and Bragg started 
on a race through Tennessee and Kentucky, marching at times on par- 
allel roads and within hearing of each other. Grant was left to guard 
Buell's communications. Finally, when relieved from this duty, he de- 
feated Price, at Corinth and on the Hatchie, and advanced South through 
La Grange and Oxford, and drove the enemy into the central part of 
the State of Mississippi. After this success he was, under peremptory 
orders from Halleck, compelled to make a retrograde movement. Prior 
to receiving this order, he had sent Sherman upon an expedition against 
Vick.jburg with 30,000 men, intending to have moved on, himself, down 
through the central part of the State in the rear of Vicksburg, there- 
by co-operating with Sherman's force. Sherman's expedition failed. 
Grant now moved with all the available force he had to Milliken's Bend, 
just above Vicksburg. At this time he had within his department about 
one hundred and twenty thousand men, whom he organized into army 
corps, numbered respectively Thirteenth, Fifteenth, Sixteenth, and Sev- 
enteenth, which were commanded respectively by McClernand, Sher- 
man, Ilurlbut, and McPherson. 

Hurlbut's corps and part of McClernand's were left at Memphis, and 
other points on the river, that his communications in the rear by the way 
of the river should be kept open. The remainder of the Thirteenth and 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 389 

the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Corps were put in camp at Lake Provi- 
dence, Milliken's Bend, and Young's Point, just below and opposite 
Yazoo River. 

For months he was engaged in cutting canals at Lake Providence 
and opposite Vicksburg and elsewhere, at the same time sending 
out expeditions in various directions over the country to ascertain, if 
possible, if there was any way to secure a foothold somewhere on the 
Yazoo River, above Haines' Bluff, so that an advance might be made by 
dry land on the north against Vicksburg. But in all of these move- 
ments failure was the result. About this time many people in the 
country began to 

LOSE CONFIDENCE IN GRANT 

and clamor for his displacement. The President of the United States, 
however, heeded not the clamor of the multitude. Having implicit con- 
fidence in Grant, he said to those who came to him that he would trust 
him "a little longer." About this time Grant determined upon a plan 
which was recognized by the military authorities of the country as 
wholly unmilitary and dangerous. They believed that it was military 
suicide and against all science of war. It was a movement, however, 
full of audacity, and in its results showed the genius of the man plan- 
ning it. He abandoned all his lines of communication, and moved 
rapidly down the west side of the Mississippi River to Bruensburg, a 
point four miles below Grand Gulf. At the same time he loaded seven 
transports with supplies, and manned them with men selected from my 
command, then the Third Division of the Seventeenth Corps, and ran 
them by the batteries of a hundred guns, which vomited forth fire 
and iron hail at them as they passed by. All passed safely except one. 
This being accomplished, he crossed the river, moving rapidly upon 
Port Gibson, where he met the enemy and defeated him. His forces 
amounted to 31,000 men, less in number than the enemy held encircling 
Vicksburg inside their works. In rapid succession came the victories 
of Raymond, Jackson, Champion Hills, Black River, and the invest- 
ment of Vicksburg. At Champion Hills the enemy received the severest 
defeat in its results that they had yet sustained up to that time. Halleck 
had written a letter to Grant, directing him to 

LEAVE VICKSBURG ALONE 

and move down to Port Hudson and assist Banks; he (Banks) being his 
superior officer, would then have been in command of the combined 
forces. After Port Hudson should fall, Halleck suggested that he should 
assail Vicksburg. Halleck's letter, however, came too late. Five bat- 



3 90 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

ties had been fought, and Grant was crossing Black River and moving 
in the direction of Vicksburg. While these battles were being fought, 
Porter, with a gun-boat fleet, passed up the Yazoo River and took pos- 
session of Haines' Bluffs, which had been evacuated in the meantime by 
the enemy. Thus it was that safe communication was reopened with 
Grant's army, and again he had a base of supplies. Pemberton was 
driven within the walls of Vicksburg and locked up, as it were, in that 
stronghold, with but sixty days' rations. Grant had then completely 
turned the tables on the enemy, and had Pemberton and his whole army 
within his grasp. 

On the 4th day of July, 1863, the long and bloody siege came to its 
termination. Pemberton surrendered to Grant. Grant, at the head of a 
victorious army, entered the city and planted the old flag upon the 
court-house, where it was unfurled to the breeze amid the shouts of his 
gallant soldiers. In the capture of Vicksburg, there were surrendered 
to Grant, 33,000 men, including 17 general officers, and 170 cannon, 

THE LARGEST CAPTURE OF MEN 

and munitions of war ever made in any modern war up to that time, 
numbering the killed, wounded, and captured. In the five battles, and 
including the siege of Vicksburg, Grant had killed, wounded, and capt- 
ured a larger number of the enemy than his whole effective force num- 
bered in the campaign. On the 8th day of July, upon the news reach- 
ing the occupants that Vicksburg had been captured, Port Hudson was 
surrendered. Thus the backbone of the rebellion was broken, the so- 
called Confederacy was cut in two, and thereafter the majestic Mis- 
sissippi rolled on "unvexed to the sea." Grant's loss in the whole 
campaign was 8,000, killed, wounded, and missing. Grant was now ap- 
plauded by the loyal people everywhere, and throughout the Nation 
denominated the military genius of the age. Even Halleck joined in 
the acclaim and telegraphed to Grant, commending him, and compar- 
ing his operations with the grandest operations of Napoleon Bona- 
parte. 

General Joseph E. Johnston had in the meantime concentrated a 
force at Jackson, Miss., and thereby was threatening the rear of Vicks- 
burg. Grant at once sent Sherman with a suitable force against John- 
ston. He moved immediately and did not hesitate to assail him. On 
the 1 6th day of July, Johnston retreated to Alabama, by way of Merid- 
ian. 

Soon the news came of the battle of Chickamauga. Rosecrans, hav- 
ing withdrawn his army within the lines of Chattanooga, was cooped 
up, with Bragg in possession of his communications, and including the 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 391 

Tennessee River on his north, had him completely encircled, seemingly 
in a position where he must sooner or later surrender 

FOR WANT OF SUPPLIES, 

both for men and animals. Grant was now ordered by the President of the 
United States to take command of that department. His first act was 
to assign Thomas to the command of the department and the Army of 
the Cumberland, in place of Rosecrans. His next was to telegraph 
Thomas to hold Chattanooga at all hazards ; that he would be there as 
soon as possible. To which old General Thomas replied : " I will hold 
the town till we starve." On the 23d of October, 1863, Grant reached 
Chattanooga. Burnside was at Knoxville. Sherman was on his way 
from Vicksburg with all the available force at his command, and Hooker 
was moving from the east with two corps. A column of the enemy 
moved against Knoxville. By the 18th of November, Grant had his 
forces well in hand and ready for an assault. Rains and storms pre- 
vented this for a few days ; but on the 23d he assaulted Lookout Moun- 
tain, the men climbing from crag to crag, and from tree to tree, until 
finally they were on the crest of the ridge ; the rebels retreated, and 
patriots planted the flag of the Republic thereon. The 24th and 25th, 
the battle of Mission Ridge was fought, and 

THE ENEMY COMPLETELY ROUTED. 

A portion of the Armies of the East, and West, and Centre, combin- 
ing, fought side by side, bravely as men ever fought. Passing through 
the dangers of that great battle, linked them together in bonds of friend- 
ship which have lasted until now. After he had defeated Bragg, and 
driven him back from this stronghold, Grant commenced maturing plans. 
for the great final campaigns. He began by ordering Sherman back 
to Vicksburg ; also a large force to march from Corinth down along 
the railroad to Jackson, destroying the road as it went. Sherman was 
ordered with his force from Vicksburg in the direction of Meridian, in 
order that the railroad and lines of communication in that part of the 
country might be destroyed, so that when he commenced his contem- 
plated campaign he could withdraw all the troops from there and con- 
centrate them into one grand army to march against the enemy in the 
centre. 

The troops under Thomas were assisting in guarding the railroads 
and lines of communication north from Chattanooga and west to Deca- 
tur. Grant directed Thomas, while the railroads were being destroyed 
from Corinth to Vicksburg, south and east from Vicksburg, to keep up 
a continuous demonstration in the enemy's front, so as to deceive him 



392 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

into the belief that an advance was to be made very soon. He also di- 
rected me toco-operate with Thomas. I then being in command of the 
Fifteenth Corps, with my headquarters at Huntsville, Ala., sent a force 
by his orders in the direction of Rome, Ga. At the same time we were 
notified to be ready, at the earliest possible moment in the spring, for a 
general advance. Grant's idea was then to move 

FROM CHATTANOOGA TO ATLANTA, 

and then to Mobile, unless something should intervene in the meantime 
to change the plan and force him to move in the direction of Savannah 
from Atlanta. He said, in a letter during that winter, that sharp fight- 
ing would occur in the spring, and if our army was successful the war 
would be ended in a year. 

Grant was now made lieutenant-general, and placed by the Presi- 
dent of the United States in command of the armies of the Republic. 
But one single person had ever held the position prior to Grant ; that was 
George Washington. Winfield Scott merely had the brevet. On the 3d 
day of March, 1864, he was ordered to Washington. His intention at that 
time was to return from Washington and lead the armies of Sherman, 
Thomas, and Schofield, to Atlanta in person. Unforeseen events, how- 
ever, changed his intention of leading the army himself, and forced him 
to the East. His campaign, however, was carried out almost to the let- 
ter, but by other hands. Grant received his commission as lieutenant- 
general 

FROM THE HANDS OF PRESIDENT LINCOLN 

in the presence of the Cabinet. On the 10th of March, he was at the front 
in Virginia ; on the 14th, he was back at Nashville, Tenn., giving instruc- 
tions to Sherman. On the 17th, he assumed supreme command of all 
the armies, and on the 23d, he was at Washington, and at once proceeded 
to make his headquarters in the field at Culpeper, Va. Heretofore the 
campaigns of the different armies had been conducted without any refer- 
ence to, or relation one with, the other. 

Grant's intention now was, that his campaign should proceed with 
one common end in view. His plan was simple. It was to concentrate 
all the available forces of the West and combine them into one grand 
army under Sherman ; a similar concentration of the armies of the 
East under Meade ; then a simultaneous and persistent advance of 
these two grand armies toward a common centre — the objective point 
of each to be the enemy in its front, and the ultimate point to be reached : 
— Richmond. Other points that might in the meantime become objec- 
tive, to be operated against as the circumstances of the case at the time 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 393 

should suggest. At the appointed time for an advance, his intention was 
that Sherman should move directly against Johnston, and 

HAMMER, POUND, AND FOLLOW HIM 

until his army was destroyed or captured. If neither the destruction 
nor capture should occur to drive him on to Mobile and then crush him, 
or on to Savannah and back on to Richmond, and there crush both the 
armies between the two great armies of the Union. At the same time 
Meade was to advance upon Lee's forces and strike him at every point, 
and fight him in every place, wherever and whenever he should find 
him, until he should break his army to pieces or capture it. Neither of 
the armies were to hesitate in carrying out this common purpose, so 
that when Richmond should fall, the two great armies of the rebellion 
should fall with it. This plan was carried out, and was a success. It 
caused us to achieve the victories that saved the Republic. There was 
but one failure in carrying it out to the letter, on both lines ; that was 
when Hood was permitted to escape from Sherman's front, from Love- 
joy's Station, back into our rear, marching against Nashville. It forced 
Thomas' army to return and follow him, while the remainder of the 
forces moved without obstruction to the sea. This failure was, how- 
ever, redeemed afterward. In the West, the grand army moved forward 
fighting battles at Dalton, Buzzard's Roost, Snake Creek Gap, Resaca, 
Lost Mountain, Dallas, Big and Little Kenesaw, Peach Tree Creek, and 
at and around Atlanta. Flank movement after flank movement was 
executed, and battle after battle was fought upon fields that 

FAIRLY RAN WITH BLOOD, 

until our victorious army occupied Atlanta. The Army of the Cumber- 
land, under Thomas, moved to the northward in pursuit of Hood, as 
before stated, striking and hammering him to pieces at Franklin and 
Nashville. 

The Army of the Tennessee and that of Georgia, under Sherman, 
marched through Georgia to Savannah, and thence through the Carolinas, 
driving before them, from Savannah, the rebel forces, through State after 
State, marching triumphantly and rapidly in the direction of Richmond. 
During this while, the great Army of the East, under Meade, its cavalry 
commanded by Sheridan, the Army of the James co-operating, all under 
the immediate command of Grant, was striking Lee's veteran Army of 
Northern Virginia wherever found. The bloody battles of the Wilder- 
ness, Spottsylvania Court House, the siege of Petersburg, the flanking 
marches and movements, as well as battles in the advance, from the Rap- 
idan upon Richmond, all evinced the valor of the Union troops, and 



„ nl LIFE OF LOGAN. 

the skill with which they were handled, as well as that remarkable te- 
nacity of purpose, which, as much as any other one quality, enabled 
Grant to earn the proud title of "savior of his country." Through that 
spring, summer, and winter, the two great armies advanced their lines 
and fought their way in the direction of the ultimate point to be attained. 
On the 2d of April, 1865, Petersburg fell. Richmond was at once evacu- 
ated by Lee, who attempted to move down in the direction of and form a 
junction with Johnston's forces now in the front of Sherman in North 
Carolina. But the constant pounding that Grant's army was giving 
Lee, with vigorous pursuit, resulted, April 9th, 

in lee's surrender. 

Johnston's surrender soon followed, being only a little more than the 
year predicted by Grant for the destruction of the two great armies of 
the rebellion. Thus the great rebellion collapsed and ended. From the 
battle at Belmont on the 7th of November, 1861, up to the surrender of Lee 
at Appomattox, Grant was the great central figure, the all-controlling 
genius of the great armies of the Republic. 

His name was on the lips of all the civilized world, as the great mili- 
tary commander of the age. Filled with renown, and covered with 
glory in the midst of his own people, and now receiving the new grade 
of General of the Army, never held by any person before him in this 
country, and which was created by law especially for him,— having re- 
ceived these high honors, in his heart he hoped that he might be per- 
mitted to enjoy in the future the comparative quiet which he had surely 
earned. But it was not to be. After the perfidy and almost treason of 
Andrew Johnson against those who had placed him in power, and 
against the best interests of our country, the people desired to secure 
a more worthy successor of Abraham Lincoln. It fell to my lot to pre- 
sent Grant's name to the National Republican Convention. He was 
proclaimed the 

UNANIMOUS CHOICE OF THE PARTY. 

This honor he sought not. It was thrust upon him by the necessities of 
the times. At the expiration of his first term, he was again called upon 
to be our civic chief, and but for a tradition that exists among the people, 
and an unwritten law permanently fixed in the minds of our people, I be- 
lieve he would have been chosen for a third time. He travelled through 
Europe and Asia. Rich gifts were showered upon him by foreign rulers 
and municipalities. The heads of rulers and great men of the nations 
of the earth were bowed in his presence. So much did he impress the 
older nations of Asia with his greatness and justness that he was se- 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 395 

lected to settle international disputes between them, as a friendly arbi- 
trator. His return to his own country was made memorable and historic 
by the ovations he received wherever his foot touched the soil. 

From Belmont to the siege of Vicksburg I was near him in nearly 
all his marches, campaigns, and battles, and was permitted by him to 
take possession of Vicksburg with my command, on account of its hav- 
ing approached nearer the enemy than any other. During my term as 
commander of that city I was with him almost every day, and from the 
time when, at the head of that glorious old Army of the Tennessee, of 
which 

HE WAS THE FIRST COMMANDER 

and I its last, I marched by his re vie wing-stand at the National Capitol, 
and down to the last painful days of his memorable life, I was with him 
very often. During all this time I was a close observer of him. Grant was 
usually known and recognized as a quiet and silent man, but, when en- 
gaged in conversation on any subject in which he felt an interest, there 
were few who excelled him as a conversationalist. He wrote tersely 
and well, and at times most eloquently. The Nation was at different 
times thrilled by his terse epigrammatic sentences. When he wrote to 
Buckner, the commander at Fort Donelson, " No terms other than an 
unconditional and immediate surrender can be accepted. I propose to 
move immediately upon your works," his words burned with the glow 
of patriotic fire in the heart of every loyal freeman. 

When he had fought the battle of the Wilderness, and wrote to the 
President : " I propose to fight it out on this line if it takes all sum- 
mer," he infused into the people and his troops a part of his own te- 
nacity and faith in final success. 

In his short speech to the committee who waited upon him inform- 
ing him of his first nomination by the Republicans as their candidate 
for Chief Magistrate, he used these words in conclusion : 

" LET US HAVE PEACE." 

These words fell upon the people with an electrical effect. His cool- 
ness, his perception, and aptness in using the right word in the right 
place and doing the right thing at the right time, were at the bottom of 
his success as a civil magistrate, just as his great faculty for doing the 
right thing at the right time and place, and sometimes in the most un- 
expected manner, was at the bottom of his military greatness. Grant 
was a man of great strength of intellect, remarkable common-sense, 
coolness, self-possession, and tenacity. He was a true friend to those 
who were worthy of his friendship. All the sympathies of his great 
heart went out to those whom he admired. He was one of the kindest 



39^ 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



and best husbands that ever lived. He was fond of, kind and generous 
to, his children. He was a man who, when he had confidence in another, 
trusted him with implicit faith. This honesty and fidelity in himself, 
with a full belief in the honesty and fidelity of others, was the source of 
all the trouble he had either in civil or military life. It has been said 
that Grant was not a strategist ; that his success was achieved by his 
courage and his persistent fighting against the enemy. I do not agree 
with this statement. In my judgment 

HE WAS WITHOUT A RIVAL 

in all that belongs to a military man in the practical science of warfare, 
either as strategist or a great commander. He was not only the equal 
of, but greater as a military commander than, Washington, Napoleon, 
Wellington, the Duke of Marlborough, the Prince of Orange, Frederick 
the Great, Charlemagne, Hannibal, or Scipio Africanus ; and in my opin- 
ion coming centuries will give to Grant a place above them all, and 
rank him the equal, if not the superior, of Julius Caesar. And when the 
mists that were thrown around his civil administration by persistent and 
bitter partisan enemies shall be dispelled by the sunlight of mature and 
honest reflection, it will shine out with all the brilliancy and glory 
that is or has been attached to any administration in the past. That 
he made some minor mistakes no one will deny. Of each and every 
administration that has been in the past and that may be in the future, 
the same may be and will be said. With Grant, duty was a living prin- 
ciple. His duty to his country and Republican institutions, was the 
question ever before him, and whenever he felt that he was right, noth- 
ing could move him from his purpose. When convinced that he was 
wrong, he was at all times ready to concede it. He was a conscientious 
man, a just man, and a truthful man, 

A MAN OF GREAT COURAGE 

and great magnanimity. He always loved his friends and stood by 
them, even while forgiving his enemies. As a military man he fought 
not for glory, but to save his country from dismemberment and servitude. 
He was at times criticised and severely censured by many, both in his 
military and civil career. The clouds of calumny lowered about him. 
He stood in their midst, with arms folded, hearing their thunders and 
witnessing the wrath of his enemies. But he spoke not in his own 
defence. He felt that to censure is easy ; to adopt what measures the 
case requires, is the part of wisdom. 

Time finally dispelled the clouds. He rose above and beyond them 
and bared his bosom to the world that his heart might be examined. 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 397 

When the light of honest judgment shone in upon it, it was found to 
be as pure as the dew-drop that hangs upon the lips of the velvet 
rose. 

Some feign to believe that Grant's success was in many respects 
accidental. This comes from a desire that seems strangely to find a place 
in human nature, never to give credit to the one who brings success or 
performs a noble act. Great arguments and orations are always pre- 
pared by some other than those delivering them. Shakespeare's works 
were written by Bacon, according to some persons who wish notoriety, 
inasmuch as they cannot become famous. Unmerited success leads 
weak minds into folly. Egotism, vanity, and ostentation always follow 
the success of the weak. None of these evidences of weakness were 
ever found in him. To maintain prosperity is much harder than to 
acquire it. In the weak it creates a false pride, but brings wisdom and 
unostentation to the strong. The latter was evidenced in Grant's every 
act. 

HE ROSE TO GREATNESS 

through no artifice or designing on his part, but by an honest perform- 
ance of his duty to his country in such an intelligent an unfailing 
manner as to win the confidence and admiration of the whole people. 
He was honest in all his views. He believed it impossible for any 
people to gain lasting power by injustice, falsehood, and inhumanity; 
that such power lasts only for a brief period ; it may blossom fairly with 
hopes, but in time must droop and die. He believed in the justice of 
God, and that sooner or later He would by some means guide him, as 
commander of our armies, to the place where justice would take the 
place of wrong, and "man's inhumanity to man " be properly rebuked. 
He believed that as any structure should have its base the firmest, so in 
human affairs the principle and foundation should be true and just. This 
not being so with the rebellion, in his opinion nothing but destruction 
finally awaited it. 

But his race had been run. This great and good man went up on 
the mountain's top to die. The attention of the whole civilized world 
was directed to that spot. His glory was not of his own country alone, 
but of the civilized races of man. When the news of his death went 
trembling over the wires to the utmost parts of the earth, the people of 
every nation and tongue stood with bowed heads. Grant, in life, had 
ascended to the topmost height of mortal fame. The greatest renown 
was his. The glory of man's greatest achievement shone around and 
about him. God called him, and he stepped from his high pedestal on 
this earth into the presence of the Great White Throne above, where 
he was crowned with immortal glory that shineth on forever. 



; 9 8 LIFE OF LOGAN. 



LOGAN BANQUETED BY THE " LOGAN INVINCIBLES AT BALTI- 
MORE — HIS " BLOODY SADDLE " SPEECH ELKINS GIVES 

GRANT'S HIGH ESTIMATE OF LOGAN. 

At the Eutaw House, Baltimore, on the evening of October 
8, 1885, General Logan was the guest of the " Logan Invin- 
cibles," at a banquet given in his honor, at which one hundred 
and fifty persons were present. In responding to the toast 
" Our Distinguished Guest," he referred at some length to 
the political outrages perpetrated against innocent citizens in 
the South, and then proceeded to say : 

Will the present administration try to remedy this evil by using the 
proper influence with the friends who placed it in power ? Or will these 
people be quietly encouraged, in order to hold the Southern States in 
solid phalanx, so that by the carrying of one or two Northern States, ac- 
cidentally or otherwise, they will hold power and control, just as seces- 
sion expected to succeed by a solid South, with Democratic allies from 
the Northern States ? But, Mr. Chairman, perhaps I am going too far 
in stating too many facts, as I see that the Democracy all over this 
country, when wrongs are charged to their party or themselves, raise 
the cry of "bloody shirt," as if by that means they would " frighten the 
souls of fearful adversaries." What do they mean by the cry : " Shaking 
the bloody shirt ?" Who has been shaking it at any of these people who 
are so fearful of that blood-stained and historic garment ? Who is it 
that has been making bloody shirts in many of the States of the Union 
by shooting down and clubbing innocent citizens, merely because they 
desire to cast a free ballot ? If facts that are historical are mentioned, 
it is called shaking the bloody shirt. If you speak of a man having re- 
belled against the Government, you are shaking the bloody shirt. I 
suppose that in the future the only thing a Republican will be permitted 
to do before an American audience will be to rise, bow to those present, 
thank God he has been permitted to live, apologize to the people for 
having been a Union man, and swear that he was deceived, and will not 
do so any more. Is this the road we are travelling now ? Sir, this does 
seem to be the tendency, and it will be persisted in by political enemies 
of this Republic unless every man determines to assert his individual 
manhood and defy the scoffers and mockers from one end of the land 
to the other. 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 399 

Then, referring to the campaign proceeding at the time, in 
Virginia, he added : 

I understand from the newspapers, and it is not contradicted, that 
there, the candidate for Governor on the Democratic ticket is travelling 
over the old State, along the highways where his army once marched, 
arousing the people, not by his great eloquence or statesmanship, but 
by having his horse caparisoned with his uncle's, Robert E. Lee's, bridle 
and saddle, and, while sitting thereon, he receives a kind of inspiration 
from the old saddle, that makes him feel as though he were in command 
of some great army, fighting for the destruction of his country. He has, 
I am told, a cavalry escort, carrying a cavalry guidon flitting to the breeze, 
which was used by some of his own command in the rebellion. From 
the shouts of the people, along where he passes, for the saddle and 
bridle, it would seem that the saddle is the candidate for Governor of 
Virginia, and not the man who rides on it. If he should be elected, it 
would doubtless be the influence of that saddle and bridle that would 
bring the necessary votes to make him chief magistrate of that common- 
wealth. Yet this is not called shaking the bloody shirt. It is the sad- 
dle he shakes, and the rebel guidon. In the case of the Virginia cam- 
paign, the blood-stained saddle appears to be the leading card. What 
Republican is crying out, "Don't shake your bloody saddle at me ! " Why, 
Mr. Chairman, if it makes the young man feel happy to mount and wob- 
ble about in his uncle's saddle, let him do it. It does him so much good, 
and it cannot hurt the saddle. Of course, these things are all right on 
the Democratic side, but if anything of the kind should ever be at- 
tempted on the Republican side, it would be called waving the bloody 
shirt. Sir, I have no malice in my heart or vindictive feeling against 
those who fought bravely and well against us, though they were in the 
wrong. But I do claim that we were right in suppressing the rebellion, 
and that they were wrong ; that if any man sees fit to speak of the wrongs 
done or attempted to be done against this country or its citizens, he has 
a right to do so ; and that if any man chooses to speak in complimentary 
terms of those who sustained and upheld the Government in its darkest 
hours, he has a right to do so. 

Later in the evening, the Hon. Stephen B. Elkins ad- 
dressed the assembled company, deservedly eulogizing the 
honored guest, and then proceeded : 

But it occurs to me that I have words about General Logan, from his 
lips that are silent, and sealed in death, which I am sure will interest 



4 Oo LIFE OF IOGAN. 

you ; words from him whose death we still mourn, as a loss to humanity 
everywhere ; whose funeral arrested the attention of the civilized world, 
and caused the sun of business, intrigue, fashion and folly in its steady 
course to stand still during the ceremonies of that sad day, the pomp 
and splendor of which have not been equalled in the annals of civiliza- 
tion ; words from Grant, some of which I beg your indulgence to recall 
from memory. 

In the summer of 1883, at his house at Long Branch, in speaking to 
a friend, of General Logan, General Grant said : The country owes him 
a debt of gratitude, probably greater than to any other man now living, 
and which, I fear, is not properly appreciated, for the influence he ex- 
erted in the beginning of the war, in favor of the Union, which was not 
only felt throughout the West, but especially contributed largely in sav- 
ing to the cause of the Union the southern half of the State of Illinois, 
honey-combed as it was then with Southern sympathizers. He said 
he first met General Logan at Springfield, 111., at the breaking out of 
the war. That he (Grant) had been appointed a colonel, and assigned 
to a regiment, the term of service of which had about expired, and the 
question of its re-enlistment was being discussed ; that he was naturally 
anxious the men should re-enlist, and was apprehensive as to the result, 
fearing that they might not. It was proposed that General McClernand 
and General Logan should make speeches to the regiment — that Logan 
had just resigned from a seat in Congress to go into the war, probably 
the only case on record, and with a majority of 20,000 behind him, the 
largest ever given in a single district. McClernand's speech, though 
strong, made but little impression on the men, but Logan's, touched 
with patriotic fire and enthusiasm, so moved them that nearly every one 
re-enlisted. This he thought was the first public utterance of Logan's 
touching the war for the Union, that reached the Nation. 

On another occasion he said that Logan was not only a great Gen- 
eral — one that could always be relied upon — but that his patriotism was 
the supreme motive that governed him during the war ; in everything 
he did he was unselfish, unmindful of himself ; he did not seek or work 
for promotion, but for the good of the cause and the success of the 
army. 

He illustrated this by referring to the time when General Thomas 
was at Nashville, and had been ordered to move his army at once, and 
not doing so, General Grant became impatient and sent for General 
Logan and told him that Thomas had not moved in accordance with 
orders, and that he (Grant) desired General Logan to go to Nashville, 
and if Thomas had not moved, to relieve him ; whereupon Logan 
earnestly remonstrated with General Grant, telling him that, probably, 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 401 

such action would offend a large element in the North, the sympathy of 
which was necessary, and if he could possibly avoid relieving Thomas, 
in the interest of the Union cause, he would prefer it. General Grant 
said this remonstrance was against Logan's promotion ; he, however, 
issued the necessary orders and gave them to General Logan to use, 
in his discretion, and he proceeded to Nashville. Logan had it in his 
power to relieve Thomas and secure his own promotion, but this he 
declined to do. General Grant incidentally remarked that his (Logan's) 
patriotism rose higher than his self-interest. Again, he said, that 
Logan, more than any other general of the war, was probably the most 
with him at his headquarters, while in the West ; that he was always 
anxious everything should be done that would satisfy the loyal element 
in the North, and retain its confidence in the armies of the Union. 
Sometimes this anxiety led him into melancholy moods, and his language 
bordered on discouragement, but as the hour for battle approached, and 
Logan had his orders, and place assigned him, he was at once full of 
enthusiasm, confident, active and eager for the contest ; adding, " He 
was always superb in action. I never had to look after Logan ; I knew 
when he had an order, it would be executed." 

General Grant said he remembered that Logan was at his head- 
quarters and apparently discouraged as to the condition of the Union 
cause and prospects of the future, giving for his reason that the South 
was solid and a unit in favor of the war, while the North was divided, 
with a large element in sympathy with the South, and went on pictur- 
ing the difficulties of the situation generally, of the Union army ; after 
listening to which, General Grant replied: " Logan, you don't take into 
account that the rebel armies have their difficulties as well as we, and 
probably they feel just as badly as you do." He said this seemed to 
strike Logan, and for the rest of the evening he was in good spirits. On 
other occasions when Logan began to recite the difficulties and troubles 
surrounding the Union cause, General Grant would remind him of the 
condition of the Southern Confederacy, and the trials and difficulties of 
its armies as well. 

He also said, that during the "Reconstruction Period," Logan always 
sustained him, and was anxious to compose ail differences between the 
North and South ; that his position on the "Inflation Bill" was clear 
and correct ; and that he was among those who sustained him in his veto 
of that bill. 

Even General Logan, with all the great honors that have gathered 

around him, both in military and civil life, may be proud that he can 

wear, through the years that are before him, and we trust they may be 

many and prosperous, such words of approbation and esteem from the 
26 



4 02 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

foremost general of his century, and among the foremost men of all the 
centuries. 

LOGAN DECLINES THE PRESIDENCY OF THE UNITED STATES 
SENATE — HIS POPULARITY STILL EXTENDING. 

Upon the meeting of Congress in December, 1885, one 
of the first questions to be decided by the United States Sen- 
ate was the election of some one of its members to the tem- 
porary presidency of that body, made vacant by the death of 
Vice-President Hendricks. In the preliminary discussions in 
the public journals and among the people, it soon became 
patent that it was the unanimous wish of the Republican 
press and people that the honor should fall to Logan. The 
Republican Senators were prompt in acknowledging the 
justice and propriety of the popular demand. On Decem- 
ber 4th, they held a caucus, in which, Senator Edmunds 
closed some complimentary remarks upon the General, with a 
motion that he be nominated by acclamation for that distin- 
guished office ; and, after several brief speeches had been 
made in favor of the motion, the question was put and agreed 
to unanimously, — this, too, despite the fact that he had made 
no secret of his disinclination for that office. 

Immediately upon the announcement, therefore, of his 
unanimous nomination to it, General Logan arose, and said : 

Mr. Chairman, from the depths of my heart I thank the Republican 
Senators for the confidence they repose in me, as expressed by the 
nomination just tendered me, by acclamation, for the position of tem- 
porary presiding officer of the Senate. I not alone thank them, but the 
people of the whole country, for the desire they seem to have that I 
should be given this very honorable position. I was, however, sir, the 
nominee of the Republican Party for the Vice-Presidency, and was 
voted for at the last election. I was not elected. For that nomination I 
then thanked the Republican Party, and, through the Senators present, I 
again return to the Republicans of the country my grateful acknowledg- 
ments. If I thought that I could better serve my constituents and my 
country by accepting this position, I would most unhesitatingly do so, 
and perform the duties to the best of my ability. I do not think so, and 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 403 

am sure that I can, by work necessary to be performed on committees 
and otherwise, do more that may be useful, by remaining in my present 
position. In fact, Mr. Chairman, the position is not to my taste, and, 
unless I thought I could perform the duties in a more satisfactory man- 
ner than other Senators, which I do not, I cannot see a necessity for me 
to occupy the chair in preference to any of my brother Senators. The 
Senate has at all times been presided over in a most satisfactory man- 
ner, since I have had the honor to be one of its members, and doubtless 
will be so again by anyone who may be selected. I am ready to assist 
in elevating anyone thus selected. And now, my brother Senators, I 
want you to know that I fully appreciate your kindness, and the great 
compliment paid me, but you must allow me to say, that after carefully 
considering the matter, I feel that I ought to decline this nomination, 
and now, most respectfully do so. 

A number of Senators having made remarks deprecating 
General Logan's declination, the General stated that the con- 
elusion had been reached by him after full deliberation, and 
he wished it to be regarded as final Hence, at a subsequent 
caucus, Senator Sherman was selected. 

Although, as has been stated, Logan was the choice of the 
Republican Party and the country for this position, yet, no 
sooner had he thus gracefully declined it, than that party and 
the country, through the journals of the day, made it manifest 
that his declination had largely enhanced his already great 
popularity, and made him only the more prominent in the 
public eye as the coming Republican candidate for the Presi- 
dency of the United States. Numberless pages might be 
filled with such utterances, which seemed to show — had not 
the mysterious hand of Providence intervened — that Logan 
was predestined to receive that supreme honor ; but space 
forbids more than the mere mention of the fact. 

NEW YEAR'S (l886) RECEPTION BY LOGAN, AT HIS WASHING- 
TON RESIDENCE A DESCRIPTIVE POEM. 

On New Year's Day of 1886, the number of people who 
visited General and Mrs. Logan at their Washington home, 
was simply immense. Logan's reception, in fact, rivalled, in 



4 o 4 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

point of numbers, if not in that of distinction, the White House 
reception, and was kept up until late in the evening. The 
main feature of Logan's New Year's reception was the veter- 
ans who thronged it ; and the following lines, written at the 
time, by Edward Renaud, descriptive of one of its incidents, 
will often, in the coming years, be read by the old soldiers, 
with emotion : 

A NEW YEAR'S CALL. 



The soldier in his parlor sat, 

The lights were burning dim ; 
The sighs the sleeping city sent 

Soared heavenward like a hymn ; 
While scents of flowers upon the air, 

Faint music o'er the way 
Told that the hours were waning fast 

That brought the New Year's Day. 

The past, his past of stirring days 

Rose round him like a dream ; 
The battle's din, a fiery blast, 

Flashed like a sabre's gleam ; 
The stirring " house," the senate-hall, 

While, like a phantom dim, 
One house with pillared porticos 

Shone 'neath the stars to him. 

The silver salvers piled with cards 

Left by the callers there 
Stood silent in the lofty room, 

Mute witnesses and fair ; 
The soldier turned to her who sat 

There, wife and friend of years ; 
And then those honest, earnest eyes 

Were dimmed with coming tears. 

" Ah ! well," he said, "the hearts of friends, 

The clasp of kindly hands, 
Are worth the sceptres and the crowns, 

The wealth of many lands, 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 405 

And when we both shall sleep the sleep 

That comes to each and all 
May that best gift of love be ours 

That crowns this earthly ball ! " 



Hark ! on the stair the footfalls fast 

Come trampling stout and strong, 
And steady as the chorus comes 

That marks the stirring song ; 
As through the opened door they come, 

Belated callers three 
With, " Logan, for a true hand-shake 

We come at last, you see ! " 

" I," said the first, whose empty sleeve 

Hung by his coat of blue, 
"/fought beside you years ago 

And voted for you, too ! " 
"And I, with two stout legs and strong 

Marched with you to the fray," 
So spake the other, " but alas ! 

With one I limped away. 

" But though I stood beside you then, 

And though I wore the blue, 
/voted with the other side, 

Yet still my heart is true ; 
Is true to all you were and are, 

And all you yet shall be — 
The nation's stoutest, manliest son — 

God grant me life to see ! " 

Up spoke the third, he wore the gray, 

" In Vicksburg's red campaign 
I fought with Pemberton where lead 

And iron fell like rain ; 
But if amidst my tears of joy 

That years have brought our due 
There fell one bitter drop, it was 

Because we ' slaughtered 'jwc" 



4 o6 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

He clasped the hands of each and all 

The wine of welcome poured, 
That feast of friendship seemed to him 

As an anthem of the Lord ; 
That stainless honor tried by fire, 

The nobler, better part ; 
The homage that the true man pays 

When stout heart speaks to heart ! 

Adown the stairs they tramped again ; 

They passed into the night, 
Where all the myriad stars of heaven, 

God's lamps, were burning bright ; 
And once again the soldier said, 

" Kind hearts and hands ! I pray 
God keep mine true and clean to clasp 

Your own next New Year's Day ! " 

LOGAN DINED BY THE PHILADELPHIA " CLOVER CLUB." 

General Logan was an honored guest at the fourth annual 
dinner of the famous non-political " Clover Club " at the Ho- 
tel Bellevue, Philadelphia, January 14, 1886. There were 
several very distinguished men present at the banquet, Han- 
cock and Logan having the places of honor to the right and 
left of the chairman. Loo;an on this occasion made what was 
described as 4" a rattling speech ; " and Wayne McVeagh, in 
his witty speech, said he thought if Logan and Hancock 
had pooled their issues in the last two campaigns they could 
have been elected, or if Hancock and Logan had done the 
same thing the result would have been the same ; but he was 
bound to say he would favor the first ticket. Logan had told 
him recently that the only candidate he feared in the future 
was Evarts. He had read Evarts' recent Boston speech, and 
had asked Logan what Evarts' position was on the silver 
question. Logan had replied that Evarts was dangerous as 
a Presidential candidate because he was in favor of unlimited 
coinage, but opposed to its circulation. Seriously he thought 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 407 

General Logan should not be a candidate for the Presidency. 
He does not run, and was never known to do so, from friend 
or enemy. 

HE AGAIN ATTACKS THE (MODIFIED) FITZ-JOHN PORTER BILL 

IN THE SENATE. 

The House of Representatives having passed a bill sub- 
stantially authorizing the President of the United States to 
nominate to the Senate Fitz-John Porter to a colonelcy in 
the Regular Army — being the rank held by him prior to his 
being cashiered and dismissed the service January 10, 1863 
— the bill, upon reaching the Senate was referred to the Mili- 
tary Committee, of which General Logan was chairman, and 
on March 11, 1886, it was favorably reported to the Senate 
by a majority of the committee. Accompanying the report 
the "views of the minority," adverse to the bill,— written by 
General Logan, and concurred in by Senators Hawley, Har- 
rison, and Manderson — were presented by Logan. The docu- 
ment containing these views is voluminous, and completely 
covers the evidence in the case ; and, after summing up that 
evidence, concludes as follows : 

We the minority therefore protest against the passage of the bill 
restoring Fitz-John Porter to the army. The success of said bill would 
be a misfortune to the country ; and no source of danger is more insidi- 
ous, its progress more rapid, and its corruption more sure, than that 
legislation which is in the interest of private favoritism at the expense 
of public justice. No case can be found in the annals of courts-martial 
where a more just verdict was rendered than in the case where Fitz- 
John Porter was tried, convicted, and dismissed from the army. We 
protest against the passage of the bill for the reason that it would stand 
hereafter as an incentive to military disobedience in the crises of arms, 
and as an assurance of forgiveness and emolument for the most danger- 
ous crime a soldier can commit. 

Subsequently, when the bill came up for action in the 
Senate, General Logan again spoke, at length, against it, with 
the same courage, energy, convincing logic, and patriotic 



4 o3 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

fervor that had characterized his other great efforts in the 
same direction, although he knew that he was leading only a 
"forlorn hope," and that the passage of the measure was a 
foregone conclusion. In this, as in so many other matters, 
Logan never failed to follow the line of his own honest con- 
victions, regardless of what others might think, or say, or 
do. 

SPEECH OX ADMISSION OF DAKOTA LOGAN RIDDLES THE DEM- 
OCRATIC OPPOSITION HE UNHORSES BUTLER. 

During January, 1S86, the bill for the admission to State- 
hood of the Territory of Dakota, was before the Senate, hav- 
ing been favorably reported by the proper committee, and 
Senator Vest took occasion in remarks he then made, in reply 
to Senator Harrison's speech favoring the bill, to violently 
assail the Union soldiers. General Logan, on February 3d, 
made a speech, the brief telegraphic synopsis of which, taken 
from the Philadelphia Press, given below, will give the reader 
a fair idea of Logan's qualities in senatorial debate, when in- 
terrupted. Says this despatch : 

General Logan taunted the Democrats with requiring an Enabling 
Act of Congress for Dakota, when eleven States had been admitted with- 
out such a formality. The Democratic opposition is because Dakota is 
Republican. 

This brought Senator Butler to his feet with an assertion that he 
didn't care whether the State was Republican or Democratic so long as 
it possessed all the requisites of Statehood and its admission was asked 
by a majority of those who had its interests at heart, but, in this in- 
stance, he had a suspicion that there was a political clique clamoring 
for admission. 

" I agree with you," said General Logan, " there is a political 
clique." He then explained that South Dakota, with its 261,000 popu- 
lation cast 57,000 votes at the election two years ago, while South Caro- 
lina, with its 700,000 

"Over a million," interjected Mr. Butler. 

" Well, that makes it all the worse," said General Logan. "With 
over a million population, South Carolina only cast 91,000 votes. On 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 409 

the adoption of the Dakota Constitution, there were 31,000 votes cast, 
and the Democrats, under instructions from the Democratic Committee, 
refrained from voting. This was the political clique." 

He then contrasted the proportion of the voting population in Da- 
kota with that of South Carolina, and said there must be something 
wrong in South Carolina. It was the same old fight over again. In 
the days of slavery, the Democrats would admit no free State unless a 
slave State was also admitted, and now they are unwilling to admit a Re- 
publican State unless a Democratic State is also brought in. He read 
Senator Harrison's remarks upon which Senator Vest based his attack 
upon the Union soldiers, and said that nothing therein could be tortured 
into a justification of Senator Vest's attack. He was sorry that it should 
be considered, by any Senator, a reproach to have been a Union soldier. 
It seemed, however, that the Democratic Party, having again got in power, 
were determined to keep it by whatever means, believing in their right 
to do so, as they formerly believed in the divine right of slavery. He 
read from an article in the Charleston News and Courier which admitted 
that, under the apportionment, the colored people of South Carolina 
would be entitled to a majority in the Legislature, but that, to guard 
against this misfortune, it was proposed to adopt a property qualifica- 
tion, not of individuals, but of counties, and thus practically disfranchise 
the poor colored people. This, perhaps, explained why there was so 
great a proportionate difference between the voting strength of that 
State and of the Territory of Dakota. 

General Logan concluded his speech by an earnest appeal for the 
admission of Dakota, as provided in the bill, claiming that in the steps 
which had been taken, thus far, the citizens of the Territory were fully 
justified by the Constitution and by precedent ; that they had every 
requisite for Statehood ; and that justice and true statesmanship de- 
manded that they should be accorded the right to become one of the 
grand galaxy of States. 

logan's idea of " decorations " — he declares against 
secret sessions of the united states senate. 

About the same time a bill beino; before the Senate to 
permit the American consul at Warsaw to accept decora- 
tions from the Government of Russia, Logan spoke against 
it, and made a wholesome sensation both there, and through- 
out the country, by declaring that "the only decoration an 



4IO LIFE OF LOGAN. 

American citizen should wear, is his daily walk and demeanor 
before his fellow-men." 

Again, on February 4, 1886, in an executive session of 
the Senate, Logan introduced a resolution providing that 
thereafter all executive business should be considered by that 
body with open doors. This he probably did, not with any 
idea that it would be adopted at once, but first with the 
object of ascertaining whether it stood a " fighting chance " 
of adoption, and second because the people, hearing of it, 
would have a chance, in time, to express themselves upon 
the subject in such a way as to lead to the overthrow of 
secret sessions. His ideas on this subject can be gathered 
from a subsequently published "interview," in which he said: 
" I have always been, and hope I shall always be, opposed 
unequivocally to the consideration of the people's business in 
secret session. In a republic, where the perpetuity of its 
institutions depends upon the intelligent and loyal support of 
all citizens, it is not best to close the doors of the Senate 
Chamber and deliberate in secret. In my judgment, execu- 
tive sessions are an abomination in the eyes of the people, 
and ought not to have place under our republican form of 
government." 

THE GREAT REPUBLICAN CLUB BANQUET IN DETROIT — LOGAN'S 
ENTHUSIASTIC RECEPTION AND STIRRING SPEECH. 

On the evening of February 21, 1886, — after attending a 
three hours' reception at Governor Alger's mansion — Logan 
participated in a grand banquet given at the Princess Rink, 
Detroit, by the Michigan Republican Club, at which Evarts 
and other distinguished men were present. The banquet was 
very elaborate. Twelve hundred persons sat down at the 
various tables. The decorations alone, cost nearly $6,000. 
Both Evarts and Logan made speeches, and, contrasting the 
effects produced by these two prominent men, the Detroit 
Evening Journal said: "When Senator Logan arose and 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 41 1 

stood facing hundreds of yelling and enthusiastic admirers, 
the contrast between himself and Evarts at once suggested it- 
self. In his keen eye, his raven-hued hair and mustache, his 
splendid physique, the conviction of dash and daring forced 
by his whole air and military bearing, he appeared the man 
to catch the applause and admiration of the masses. His 
nerves seemed unshaken, while he found only gratification 
and inspiration in the surroundings. Resting one hand upon 
the table before him, he awaited silence, presenting a picture 
that did not tend to induce a cessation of cheers. When he 
opened his address it was in a low, mellow, but penetrating 
voice. As he warmed, his physical and mental organisms 
seemed to unite in their efforts to impress. His gestures were 
almost constant. They were at times violent. He perspired 
freely. He was an orator who charged the people with the 
ardor of a dashing soldier and carried them before him. It was 
not elegance of diction or beauty of sentiment that troubled 
the General. He wanted results, and went for them." The 
toast to which he replied was: "Washington the Republi- 
can, — he believed in the voice of the people, which can only 
be heard through a fair ballot and an honest count," and the 
published accounts said that Logan alluded to the memory of 
Washington "in his most eloquent language." From one 
of these reports the following brief extract touching Logan's 
speech is given : 

After stating the principle of representation as based upon popula- 
tion, the speaker proceeded to show that the population in many States 
was misrepresented through the power of the dominant party exercised 
outside the ballot-box, and outside their rights as law-abiding citizens. 
The figures which demonstrated the charges made against the Demo- 
cratic Party were produced in a comparison of the population and votes 
of Florida, South Carolina, and Mississippi, of the South, and Michi- 
gan, Wisconsin, Illinois, Iowa, and Minnesota, of the North. Numerous 
other comparative figures were produced, all tending to show that in 
the South the popular will was defeated through Democratic disregard 
of law, and that the Southern Democratic States, by their course, pro- 



412 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



cured a much larger relative representation than Northern Republican 
States. Over seven hundred and eighty thousand voters in nine Southern 
States were not represented, and they comprised the Republicans, who 
were defrauded of their rights of citizenship. This meant that the negro 
vote was rejected. It meant that the Constitution was defied. It meant 
that the men who, by rebellion, forfeited their rights to vote, were de- 
priving the negroes of that right ; but, as sure as fate, there will come a 
time when this thing must stop. Some time there will be a candidate for 
President who will not permit his men to be thus driven from the polls. 
He hoped the curse of war would never again be brought upon the 
people, but the same causes that precipitated the rebellion are again at 
work. The South is unified by the Democracy. The Senator said he 
had grave fears for the future. Every Republican that loves his coun- 
try ; that believes in this Union ; every man who believes that the glory 
of this country belongs to her sons, should come forward and say : " I 
am for law and order. I am for the Republican Party." . . . By 
way of conclusion, the Senator admitted that he and Senator Evarts had 
an ulterior motive in visiting Michigan. Mr. Evarts wanted to correct 
his sentences, and the gentleman from Illinois to correct his grammar. 
[Great applause and laughter.] 

logan's eloquent advice to the American negro — the 
possibilities of that race. 

Early in March, 1886, Logan made an address to the 
colored people at the Metropolitan A. M. E. Church, in 
which he said some very wise and striking things — among 
them, these : 

I tell you our white people are fast growing indolent and lazy. If 
you watch your chances and take timely advantage of the opportunities 
offered you, your race will be the wage-workers, the skilled artisans, 
and, eventually, the land-owners and the wealthy class of this country. 
I advise you to learn trades ; learn to become machinists. You have 
the ability and capacity to reach the highest point, and even go farther 
in the march of progress than has any people, yet. Slavery not only 
blighted you and stinted your growth, but it also blighted the intellect 
and dulled the perception of the Southern whites who dealt in it. Do 
you know that the South never produced a great historian, a great poet, 
a great inventor, nor a great musician ? This was left for the North. 
Yet all this is possible with your people. I predict that the time will 
come, and it is not far off, when we will have a negro poet from the 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 413 

South. He will set the magnificent splendor of the " Sunny South" 
to music. His muse will touch the lyre, and you will hear the sweet 
murmur of the stream, the rippling waters, and we shall see the beauty 
of that country as it was never seen before. He will come ; and, after 
him, other still greater men. But it takes labor to make a great man, just 
as it takes centuries to make a great nation. . . . The future is 
yours, and you have it in which to rise to the heights or descend to the 
depths. 

logan's great memorial-day oration at the tomb of 
grant, riverside park, new york, 1 886. 

The 31st day of May, 1886, was a day ever to be remem- 
bered in the history of New York City. It was Memorial 
Day, the first since the death of Grant, and a demonstration, 
unprecedentedly grand, was made in honor of that illustrious, 
man and warrior, and of the countless thousands of other 
Union heroes of less degree who died that the Nation might 
live. There was a grand parade upon the water, of ships, 
of the North Atlantic squadron and other vessels, and, 
through the streets, of the military — the latter so extensive 
that the march past the reviewing-stand, occupied by President 
Cleveland, and other distinguished persons, consumed two 
hours. All New York was out of doors to witness the un- 
wonted spectacle, while at Riverside Park, about the tomb 
of Grant — which was " buried beneath tons of roses and other 
flowers sent from all parts of the country " — was gathered an 
assemblage " estimated at forty thousand people," to listen to 
the interesting memorial exercises of the Grand Army of the 
Republic, and to the great oration pronounced by Logan upon 
the departed chieftain. Wherever Logan appeared and was 
recognized he was greeted with cheers, and his " tribute to 
Grant " was " received with enthusiasm," when uttered, and 
with well-merited encomiums by the general press and pub- 
lic when they read it in the journals of the land. It was re- 
garded as a " masterpiece of oratory," worthy of its great 
subject, and of himself. It was the last great memorial 



414 LIFF < OF LOGAN. 

oration that Logan lived to make, and was in these eloquent 
words : 

Comrades, Ladies and Gentlemen — A great poet and marvellous 
delineator of human character and impulses, a dramatist to whom pos- 
terity has conceded the first rank, has placed in the mouth of one of his 
characters the words : 

" Blow, blow, thou winter wind, 
Thou art not so unkind 
As man's ingratitude." 

For three hundred years this verdict of the bard of Avon has been 
silently accepted by the readers of his enchanted works until the strict- 
ure it represents has come to be considered in the light of a truism. 

The sentiment it expresses has found frequent and varied repetition 
by pessimistic writers, weeping declaimers, superficial observers, and 
turgid orators bewailing the imperfections of human nature. 

Standing at the farther end of three hundred years, Shakespeare 
has passed a sentiment down the line of the centuries which has been 
amplified by a sorrowing mentor of our own time into the broad dec- 
laration that "Republics are ungrateful." And thus, upon the one 
hand we are confronted by the allegation of the inspired poet, and upon 
the other we are met by its corollary ; the full proposition being re- 
duced to the statement, men and republics are alike ungrateful. 

Friends, upon this closing day of the budding spring, when " hoary 
frosts have fallen in the fresh lap of the crimson rose," our smiling land 
presents a scene that should forever blot from the record the slander of 
the poet and the silly carping of the politician. 

Millions of people have gathered to-day to sing paeans of gratitude 
to their sleeping benefactors, and, with one loud voice to chant anthems 
of sweet appreciation, that may rise from earth to heaven like — 

" Saboean odors from the spicy shore 
Of Araby the blest." 

We have come to claim our share in this beautiful and grateful ser- 
vice, and to perform our parts in an act that possesses no quality of a 
task. To be an American citizen, officiating in a service of gratitude to 
the fallen defenders of his country, is but second to being numbered 
among those to whom this homage is rendered. No more lofty acts 
are to be found in the records of authentic history than the noble 
sacrifices of the American soldier upon the field of battle and the votive 
offerings of his countrymen upon the holy altar of his memory. 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 415 

You have devolved upon me the duty of voicing your sentiments of 
fellowship, of gratitude, and of affection upon a day that has been con- 
secrated to the American soldier — one that will continue to be observed 
by our countrymen as long as the Republic shall last or patriotism 
shed its beams across our happy homes. 

Kind indulgence alone has prompted you to thus honor one that had 
the good-fortune to closely follow a leader who, since your last tribute 
to our departed comrades, has taken his place beside thepale sleepers 
— he that now here rests by the murmuring waters of the historic Hud- 
son, and a,bout whose tomb requiems are sung by gentle voices swelling 
from the tree-tops and mountain-sides of the mystic Catskills. 

A realization of my inability to measure up to the full requirements 
of such an occasion stares me in the face, but one owing everything to the 
indulgence of his countrymen must ever feel reliant under their support. 

Assembled countrymen ! A quarter of a century has fallen into the 
abyss of eternity since the vernal air of an April morning rang out the 
announcement that " war, horrid war," was full upon our people. Men 
and women are now before me in the full growth and estate of maturity, 
who have come upon the stage of life and action since that appalling 
event occurred. 

But they know, as well as the actors in it, the sad story of that blight- 
ing conflict, when men of the same nationality met in opposing ranks 
upon the field of battle. Their hearts swell with the same pride of 
country and palpitate with the same beat of gratitude as do those of 
the men and women who lived through the crucial test, whereby the 
strength of the Republic was tried in the fire of steel. Two million 
three hundred and thirty-five thousand nine hundred and fifty-one pa- 
triots voluntarily left their homes, their families, and their peaceful pur- 
suits, to defend upon the battle-plain and over the swelling wave the 
principle then submitted to decision under the dread arbitrament of 
war. Of this vast number, as we learn from a report of the Adjutant- 
General, three hundred and sixty thousand graves in the National 
cemeteries mark the number of those killed in battle, and dying in 
hospitals, upon road-sides, in prisons, as the result of wounds, of disease, 
of hardships, of exposure, or of maltreatment. 

We are not here to talk of causes that demanded the sacrifices repre- 
sented by these figures, nor yet to narrate thrilling incidents of battle 
with fascinating stories of gallant patriotism. But, my friends, nearly 
one-half million young, brave, useful lives have suffered untimely ex- 
tinguishment through the cruel circumstances of war, and within the 
close circle of that excruciating fact is to be found the moving causes 
of the remarkable scene this day enacted in our country. 



4 i6 LIFE OF IOGAN. 

It is no new custom to offer oblations in memory of the dead. In 
every age of intelligent man, the struggles of life have been sustained 
by a belief in, and a "longing after immortality." There is no existing 
record of the human race that does not attest this interesting fact. 
Monuments, mounds, and sepulchres, that have survived the names of 
individuals and outlasted their more perishable bodies, alike bear wit- 
ness of it. Homer declares that "all folk yearn after the gods;" and 
this observation is no less true of those who worshipped the monstrous 
creations of the Nile, the Orantes, the Ganges, the Pagan deities of 
Greece and Rome, and the varied inventions of all rude theologies down 
to the annunciation of the Christian Saviour. 

* The pyramids of Egypt, some seventy in number, were built as 
tombs for fearful monarchs yearning after the gods, and longing for 
immortality. These piles represent an amazing effort of construction. 
The mighty Cheops, standing upon a level base within the Libyan 
chain, still rears its lofty peak five hundred and forty-three feet, thus 
towering within a few feet of the pinnacle of the beautiful shaft 
erected upon the banks of the Potomac to the " Father " of a mighty 
nation. 

One hundred thousand men toiled beneath the sun of Egypt for 
half a century to erect that tomb in order that the pygmy who was to 
occupy it might, under the Egyptian theology, be saved to the longed- 
for immortality. For four thousand years it has waged battle with the 
elements. Within that period men have come and gone, empires risen 
and fallen, nations have been born and have decayed, the world has 
emerged from darkness to light, and the uncertain scratching upon the 
massive pile, recording the name of Khufa (Kufu), the probable builder, 
voices the only sound familiar to the ears of the faithful Sphinx, whose 
gaze for the master's coming has been fixed across the shifting sands for 
forty wishful centuries. 

Far back in the uncertain light of an almost vanished age, when 
human bodies were carefully preserved to await their expected reunion 
with the spirit, evidence of the common belief meets us in unequivocal 
forms. The mummies of Egypt were provided with means of subsist- 
ence during the waiting-period, and grains of wheat taken from a tomb, 
sealed from the gaze of man for three thousand years, after planting in 
our day have grown like the ordinary cereal. The prehistoric races of 
America come to us with interesting testimony upon this same point. 
Who were the mound-builders? We do not know, certainly ; but the 
evidence accessible to us shows their belief in a future, and a provision 
for it. The excavated tombs of Mexico, Central and South America, 
demonstrate the existence of a people whose era antedates the period of 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 417 

the American Indian, as well as of the races found in the new world by 
the Spanish conquerors. The mummies of those ancient people are in 
some localities as perfect as any found in Egypt, while the surroundings 
point to an analogous religious belief. The tombs contain cooking- 
utensils, articles of provision, implements for the chase and for defence. 

The monument period of America represents a still later era and a 
more advanced people. The monuments and sculptures of Palenque in 
Mexico, in Yucatan, in Copan, and other places, reveal the same belief in 
a future state, that had constantly budded from the flower of hope — from 
the first day that man's voice vibrated upon the cheery air of morning. 

The universal credence in an unrevealed future sought fatting ex- 
pression, in the very earliest times, in a tender regard of the living for 
the dead. Before the full development of language, communication 
consisted largely of symbolic expression, and by this mode of speaking 
some of the most beautiful truths of nature have always been illustrated. 
It was no less natural than poetic to call in the vegetable and floral 
worlds to represent the verdict of the ages, against the hopeless doc- 
trine of final extinction. 

The growth of flowers in spring indicates the arrival of the fruitful 
earth, after a period of quiescence, which bears a perilous semblance of 
death. The idea conveying intimation of life, after apparent death, 
was the offspring of the earliest thought ; and its susceptibility of en- 
largement has been made to express, more or less arbitrarily, the ideas 
of power, dominion, love, sorrow, joy, friendship, hate, and almost ev- 
ery human emotion, through the symbolism of the vegetable world. 
Flowers in sculpture form part of the head-dresses of the Egyptian 
sphinxes, while the worship of the sacred bull was largely an ovation of 
these beautiful emblems of devotion. 

In the ancient republics of Greece and Rome the crown of honor 
was formed of laurel or of olive leaves. The former was the Daphne 
of the early Greeks, and among them was sacred to Apollo. Victors 
in the Pythian games were crowned with a wreath of laurel leaves, 
which thus became the symbol of triumph. Under the mythologic tra- 
dition, lightning could not strike it, and hence the Emperor Tiberius, 
in later times, wore a chaplet of laurel during thunder-storms. Julius 
Caesar constantly wore a laurel wreath, indicative of dominion ; and 
Augustus and his successors followed the example. Pliny tells us that 
laurel was used as a sign of truce, like the olive branch, and that let- 
ters were garnished with it. The modern poet laureate is an officer of 
the household of the British sovereigns, and the office originated from 
a custom of the English universities, to present a wreath of laurel to 
the new graduates, who thus became poeta laureatus. 
27 



4I 3 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

The ancient Druids held their mystic worship in groves of oak, shut 
out from the common gaze. Their symbol was an oak tree with the 
mistletoe growing upon it ; the former representing God and the latter 
indicative of a man leaning upon Him for support. 

Among the Romans, oak leaves formed the patriot's crown ; bay 
leaves the poet's ; myrtle was the crown of beauty ; olive the token of 
peace ; ivy the representative of Bacchus ; and cypress the emblem of 
mourning. 

The Greeks were among the first to introduce the free use of flowers 
as part of the symbolic language of mankind. The Phrygian festivals 
were largely celebrated with them. The deity of earth was supposed 
to sleep during the winter, and in the autumn was put to rest with im- 
posing ceremonies. Upon the opening of spring he was awakened 
mid shouts of glee and the strewing of flowers. The far-famed mys- 
teries of Eleusis taught the lesson of man's progress through life to the 
perfection beyond the grave, and illustrated the temporary nature of 
death through the symbolic expression of the floral world. 

By one poet, flowers have been called "the blooming alphabet of 
creation," and by another " the prophets of immortality." They have 
been largely used as a device of heraldry, and as such the fleur de lis be- 
came an ornament of the crowns of royalty and of the dress and armor 
of the nobility in such countries as Germany, Spain, and England ; 
and in the latter the red and the white roses signalized the warring 
houses of Lancaster and of York. The fletir de lis became the national 
emblem of France, the thistle of Scotland, and the shamrock of Ire- 
land. 

The rude warriors of the Middle Ages, becoming imbued with the 
symbolism of flowers, carried these emblems from fair hands through 
all the years of chivalry. The aborigines of Mexico annually laid 
killed animals, vegetables, and flowers upon the graves of dead friends, 
and in some parts of that country the custom is still continued. 

But the beautiful ceremonies of love and remembrance now so uni- 
versally performed with flowers came to their fullest expansion through 
the growth of the Christian religion. Branches of palm were thrown 
in the path of the Saviour as he entered Jerusalem. The crucified 
Christ received a crown of thorns from His executioners, but flowers 
strewn by unseen hands exhaled their fragrance around the cave wherein 
His body lay. 

The important feasts of all the churches are now largely celebrated 
with flowers. Every religion that promises a renewal of life after the 
sleep upon earth symbolizes its faith through the blooming beauties of 
the lloral-tribes. From the baptismal font to the last couch of man 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 419 

there lies but a single step ; and the rose which unfolded its crimson 
petals to the morning air of the child may, in the evening, give place to 
the gentle amaranth, that unfading emblem of immortality, as it speaks 
of hope from the grave of the man. 

Men and women of America ! we have come with beautiful flowers 
and evergreens, culled by the eager hands of our brothers, and woven 
into speaking forms by the fair fingers of our sisters, to render the 
homage due to patriots, who have died for their country, and for all 
mankind. Let that not be considered an extravagant expression. The 
now silent soldier, whose life-work is finished, championed a principle 
toward which the warriors and armies of the world have been constantly 
drifting from the earliest recorded struggles upon the plain of Shinar. 

This principle — the rights of man and the liberty of the individual — 
which was planted with the first blood ever shed in behalf of govern- 
ment, has, like the flower, bloomed upon the morning air of all the ages. It 
has been the task of royalty to cut it down as a weed encumbering the 
grain. Wafted by the wind of destiny, its seed found lodgment upon 
the fertile soil of America, where it has grown and filled the world with 
its sweetness. Our brothers, whose memory we honor to-day, gave their 
lives to perpetuate its growth and progress to the end of time. They 
comprehended that a dissolution of the American Union meant a kill- 
ing frost to the flower of liberty and a withering of the cherished hope 
of the race. Did these revered warriors hesitate in duty through con- 
siderations of self ? No ! They sprang to the defence, and from out 
the nettle danger they plucked the flower safety for their country and 
posterity. 

The world will not soon forget the couplet of Simonides, in com- 
memoration of the men who fell at Thermopylae. 

" Stranger, the tidings to the Spartans tell 
That here, obeying their commands, we fell." 

It were most unjust to the American soldiers, fellow-citizens, whose 
memory we honor, to compare them with the band of rude men who, 
twenty-four hundred years ago, accepted death, not in behalf of a great 
principle destined to follow mankind to the end, but in simple obe- 
dience to the Spartan law, commanding the soldiers to be victorious or 
to die upon the field. 

Leonidas, with his three hundred men, saw that death for them was 
an unalterable conclusion. They must die in the contest, or, in flying 
from their position, accept the death-penalty from the hands of the vio- 
lated law. They selected death by the Persian spear ; but in dying they 
sent back the reproach that they had been sacrificed by command of 
their country. 



420 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



Was any American soldier immolated upon a blind law of his coun- 
try ? Not one ! Every soldier in the Union ranks, whether of the reg- 
ular army or not, was, in the fullest sense, a member of the great, the 
imperishable, the immortal army of American volunteers. Those gal- 
lant spirits now lie in untimely sepulchre. No more will they respond 
to the fierce blast of the bugle or the call to arms. But let us believe 
that they are not dead, but sleeping! Look at the patient caterpillar, 
as he crawls on the ground, liable to be crushed by every careless foot 
that passes. He heeds no menace, and turns from no danger. Regard- 
less of circumstances, he treads his daily round, avoided by the little 
child sporting upon the sward. He has work, earnest work, to perform, 
from which he will not be turned, even at the forfeit of his life. Reach- 
ing his appointed place, he ceases even to eat, and begins to spin those 
delicate fibres which, woven into fabrics of beauty and utility, contrib- 
ute to the comfort and adornment of a superior race. His work done, 
he lies down to the sleep from which he never wakes in the old form. 
But that silent, motionless body is not dead ; an astonishing metamor- 
phosis is taking place. The gross digestive apparatus dwindles away ; the 
three pairs of legs, which served the creature to crawl upon the ground* 
are exchanged for six pairs suited to a different purpose ; the skin is 
cast ; the form is changed ; a pair of wings, painted like the morning 
flowers, spring out, and presently the ugly worm that trailed its slow 
length through the dust is transformed into the beautiful butterfly, bask- 
ing in the bright sunshine, the envy of the child and the admiration of 
the man ! Is there no appeal in this wonderful and enchanting fact to 
man's highest reason ? Does it contain no suggestion that man, repre- 
senting the highest pinnacle of created life upon the globe, must un- 
dergo final metamorphosis, as supremely more marvellous and more 
spiritual, as man is greater in physical conformation, and far removed 
in mental construction from the humble worm, that, at the call of nature, 
straightway leaves the ground and soars upon the gleeful air ? 

Is the fact not a thousand-fold more convincing than the assurance 
of the poet : 

It must be so ; Plato, thou reasonest well ; 

Else whence this pleasing hope, this fond desire, 

This longing after immortality ? 

Or whence this dread secret and inward horror 

Of falling into naught ? Why shrinks the soul 

Back on herself, and startles at destruction ? 

'Tis the divinity that stirs within us ; 

'Tis heaven itself that points out an hereafter, 

And intimates eternity to man. 

Eternity ! thou pleasing dreadful thought. 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 421 

Let us bring flowers in the spring-time, my friends, and by their 
gentle office — whether the bodies of our comrades and defenders lie 
buried beneath the soil of our common country, or await the final tran- 
sition in the grottos of the fretful ocean — we may symbolize our faith, 
and load the atmosphere with the fragrant gratitude of an appreciative 
generation. 

*• Bring flowers, then, to their memory ; 
Throw hither all your quaint, enamelled eyes, 
That on the green turf sucked the honeyed showers, 
And purple all the ground with vernal flowers. 
Bring the rath primrose that forsaken dies ; 
The tufted crow-toe and the pale jessamine ; 
The white pink and the pansy, streaked with jet ; 

The glowing violet, 
The musk-rose, and the well-attired woodbine, 
With cowslips wan that hang the pensive head, 
And every flower that sad embroidery wears." 

Friends and countrymen, since last our comrades met to perform the 
service that we now render to our fallen heroes, other distinguished sol- 
diers have been called from the ranks of the living. Nature herself is 
in mourning. Every breeze that plays through the open leaves of sum- 
mer ; every stream that murmurs on its course to the mighty sea ; and 
every sound that marks the life of matter upon its ceaseless round, is 
burdened with a sigh. The song of every bird that tunes its lay to the 
awakened deity of the year is marred in sweetness by an involuntary 
note of sorrow. The hum of business has been muffled. The works of 
man have been paralyzed. His voice has been broken with emotion, and 
the nations of the world have hung their temples in black. Nature, 
through her breezes and murmuring streams and her songs of busy 
matter ; the birds, through their carols ; and men and nations, through 
their common humanity ; have united in one sad wail for the loss of a 
noble man, and a greater leader than ever before marshalled troops in 
fierce array of battle. 

The silent chief, whose work is destined to influence posterity to the 
latest syllable of recorded time, has gone to his couch, and neither the 
call of his country nor the siren-beckoning of earthly glory will e'er 
break the soundness of his sleep upon this hither side of eternity. The 
mortal remains of Ulysses S. Grant repose in peace beneath the weep- 
ing vault of yonder tomb. The ravages of time will reduce them to 
ashes, and the lapse of ages will transform those ashes to other forms of 
matter ; all that was earthly of that noble figure will change its form of 
materiality, and at last the mere personality of Grant will be extin- 
guished and forever lost to human gaze. 



422 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

"Can it be ? 
Matter immortal, and shall spirit die ? 
Above the nobler shall less noble lie? 
Shall man alone, for whom all else revives, 
No resurrection know ? Shall man alone, 
Imperial man, be sown in barren ground, 
Less privileged than grain on which he feeds? " 

But, my friends, the supreme work that our now sleeping hero per- 
formed, will endure until the wrecking of the human race shall leave 
this planet a mere counterpoise of the other mighty worlds that pursue 
their ceaseless roll around the blazing orb of light and day, waiting their 
appointed time to cast themselves into the arms of their sire. 

Friends, this noble man's work needs no monument, no written scroll, 
in order that it may be perpetuated. It is higher than the dome of St. 
Paul's ; it is loftier than St. Peter's ; it rears itself above the pyramids ; 
it soars beyond the highest mountain-tops ; and it is written in letters 
of the sunbeam across the blue arch that forever looks down upon the 
busy tribes of men. 

It were a task of supererogation to repeat at such a time the fasci- 
nating story of this great man's life, or with careful hand to trace his 
career from the period when, taking command of the Twenty-first Regi- 
ment of Illinois Volunteers as its colonel, that career began, until, as 
lieutenant-general of the armies of the United States, he received the 
sword that misguided men had placed against the breast of new-born 
Liberty. 

It has been justly observed that no substantial success attended the 
Union arms until the historic proclamation of emancipation had been 
promulgated, and it may well be added that no comprehensive plan for 
the final crushing of the enemy was conceived until the mighty chief- 
tain, to whose tomb we are this day sorrowing pilgrims, was placed in 
position by the immortal Lincoln to lead the Union hosts to a certain 
and final triumph. 

In the dark hours of i86r, a star arose in the heavens that, beginning 
its flight from Belmont, took within its orbit Fort Henry and Fort 
Donelson, Pittsburg Landing, Corinth, Port Gibson, Raymond, Jack- 
son, Champion Hills, Black River, and Vicksburg, where for a short 
time it paused. Renewing its rapid course, it winged its way to Look- 
out Mountain and to Mission Ridge, when it came to rest directly over 
the head of the man whose name had been written in the book of Fate 
as the instrument to snatch from destruction the offspring of all the pre- 
ceding ages. 

From the moment that Grant was invested with the supreme com- 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 423 

mand, the triumph of the Union arms became a simple question of time. 
An unlooked-for chance might postpone it ; but as well might it be at- 
tempted to turn the avalanche in its overwhelming crash as to avert the 
force of those irresistible hosts that, under the direction of an appointed 
genius, were fatally enveloping the armies of resistance. From Chat- 
tanooga to Atlanta, and from the Wilderness to Richmond, some of the 
most brilliant military movements, and many of the most gallant battles 
ever fought, adorned the Union generalship and arms. 

That lamentable weakness of human nature, jealousy, prompted de- 
traction and misrepresentation ; but the enemy in the toils, and the brave 
Union soldier executing those rapid and remarkable movements, felt 
alike that a master hand was at the helm of battle, and that a whirlwind 
of power was upon the field. The silent commander was a sphinx, but 
he was likewise an oracle ; he was a plain, unpretending man, but also 
a soldier, with a skill of profession, a rare courage, a cool head, a quick- 
ness of judgment, a celerity of decision, and a rapidity of movement 
that made him wholly invincible. 

When Caesar, after conquering the Syrian king, Pharnaces, penned 
the shortest military despatch in the annals of war, " I came, I saw, I 
conquered," his words were not fraught with a tithe of the importance 
attached to the laconicism of the American general, announcing a de- 
termination " to fight it out on this line if it takes all summer." And 
when the cowled priest of the Middle Ages chanted his church ritual and 
invoked the blessing pax vobiscum, upon his half-military, half-religious 
congregations, no such fire was kindled, no such electrical ddnoAment 
was witnessed, as when the leader of enormous armies and the subju- 
gator of a splendid military force, exclaimed to his countrymen : " Let 
us have peace ! " 

When Shakespeare wrote of Julius Caesar, " He was the foremost 
man of all this world," Grant had not then lived. Envy has sought to 
take away from this grand hero many of the qualities upon which his 
brilliant success depended. As a mere military leader and wonderful 
tactician, there is no figure in history that surpasses him, not even the 
imperious Caesar ; while viewed from a stand-point that considers the 
importance to mankind of the work he performed, his name must be 
written with that of the immortal Washington upon a scroll that will re- 
main bright after the military marvels of the past ages are forgotten of 
the race. 

Cyrus, the Persian, during his brief career, extended the Persian 
empire from the Indus to the Hellespont, and from the Jaxartes to the 
Syrian coast. Beyond the circumstances of an accidental agency in 
delivering the Jews from Babylonish captivity, what contributions did 



4 2 4 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

Cyrus make to the progress of the world, by his feats of arms and con- 
quests? He established a military power that under his successor, Da- 
rius, sought to crush the Greek civilization beneath the fetich super- 
stitions of the East ; and when the monster empire fell to pieces, the 
world was the gainer by its destruction. 

Alexander was no abler soldier than Grant. His successes were 
achieved through the superior training of the Greek soldier, inured to 
hardship and taught to conquer or to die. The overwhelming phalanx 
was not the invention of Alexander, whose successful achievements 
were largely dependent upon the fact that his troops represented the 
strongest and most advanced military power at that time in existence. 
Judged by the test that we would apply to Grant, what was Alexander's 
worth to the world ? He established a valuable library, afterward burned 
through the campaigns of Caesar ; while incidentally he carried the ad- 
vanced knowledge of the Greeks to the nations that he conquered. 
But his whole career was selfish, and his ends personal. He had no 
high purpose to establish better governments, nor to create happier 
peoples. His life's dream was conquest for the mere love of conquest. 
At the age of twenty-five he was the supreme ruler of Western Asia ; 
and, at thirty-three, he died with a sigh upon his lips that there were no 
other worlds that he might have conquered. 

When Rome was mistress of the world, Julius Caesar was master of 
Rome. He was a soldier, a general, a statesman, an orator, an histo- 
rian, a mathematician, and an architect. And yet, in all that go to 
make up a man whose services are worthy of the commemoration of the 
human race, what benefits resulted from his success ? 

During Caesar's military life, over one million men fell in his various 
campaigns. Stripped of their mere military glory, what boon befell 
the world as the result of his achievements? During the zenith of 
Roman power, one hundred million people were embraced within its 
empire, and not less than half of these were held in slavery. Men and 
women were sold upon a market-block like cattle, at a price as low as 
twenty dollars per head. The small number living in Italy, styled the 
civis Romanus, alone enjoyed any political independence, or had any 
share in the government ; while a standing army of three hundred and 
fifty thousand soldiers was maintained to keep the provinces in subjec- 
tion. In the gladiatorial ring, men were immolated for the amusement 
of aristocratic idlers, and the issue of life or death depended from the 
capricious thumbs of Roman females. 

What a glorious work of regeneration lay within the grasp of Caesar! 
Did he attempt reform ? Did he give liberty to the slave ? Did he 
stop the sport with human blood ? Did he restore the republic that 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 425 

fell with the murder of the Gracchi ? He grasped power by overriding 
the laws. He constituted himself Imperator, in the practical sense of 
emperor ; and prepared the way for the actual empire under Au- 
gustus. 

A greater man than Caesar, because more godlike, has lived in our 
day, and now lies in state within the sacred walls of yonder tomb. 

And what of other military geniuses ? The field of Marathon was 
won by a Greek general who was afterward tried by his country- 
men for a capital offence, and condemned to suffer the death-penalty. 
Pompey, the Roman, represented the aristocracy of Rome, and fell in 
their defence. Hannibal's brilliant genius was given, not to the estab- 
lishment of a broad principle, important to humanity, but to the main- 
tenance of the commercial supremacy of his country. Scipio Africanus 
but followed the legend of Rome — Delenda est Carthago — and knew no 
loftier purpose than the destruction of a commercial rival. The em- 
pire of Charlemagne, representing no new epoch in history, and no es- 
tablishment of a great principle, fell to pieces after his death. Welling- 
ton was not as great a soldier as Napoleon ; while his sword was carried 
at the simple command of a sovereign not often just, and never magnan- 
imous. In something less than a quarter of a century, Napoleon Bona- 
parte came upon the field of human activity, ran through his dazzling 
career, and, like an eagle shorn of both talons and pinions, was cooped 
up in a narrow prison-walk, where he was destined to terminate his 
days in inglorious complaint. During his brief career, the European 
world was shaken to its centre, nations were overthrown, dynasties lev- 
elled with the dust, new states were brought into being, and unknown 
men were called to rule them. The fields of Europe became encamp- 
ments of moving armies, and the world rang with the glory of a soldier, 
who was mysteriously spoken of as " the man of destiny." At the termi- 
nation of the period mentioned, this human meteor had risen and flashed 
along the sky, had culminated in the zenith of military glory, and had 
disappeared beneath the horizon, leaving scarce a line to mark its brill- 
iant passage. Some substantial results have remained to the French 
people from the career of Napoleon ; but, for the most part, his achieve- 
ments were personal in character, and their only glory lies beneath the 
earth that covers his remains. He found France wading through blood 
to reach republicanism, and, through personal ambition, he riveted the 
chain of empire upon it. The Roman general, Sulla, was one of the 
most brilliant military geniuses of his period. His career covers an 
important page of Roman history. After his death a monument was 
erected to honor him, upon which was inscribed an epitaph that he 
himself had written, as follows : " I am Sulla, the fortunate, who in the 



426 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



course of my life have surpassed both friends and enemies ; the former 
by the good and the latter by the evil I have done them." 

Men and women of America ! in our generation a man has lived, 
great enough as a military leader to subdue a force of insurrection that 
could have annihilated any army of the world from the time of Cyrus 
down to that of Napoleon. A man has lived, who, weighed with the 
enormous results flowing from his work into the ramifications of the 
unknown future, was immeasurably greater than Cyrus, above Alexan- 
der, grander than Caesar, supreme over Pompey, Hannibal, and Scipio, 
towering among Charlemagne, the Prince of Orange, Frederick the 
Great, Wellington, and Napoleon, and whose name is not to be men- 
tioned in connection with those of Miltiades and Sulla. In all authen- 
tic military history, the work of but one individual approaches that of 
Grant. Two names should be chiselled upon the majestic column that, 
leaping from the banks of the Potomac, rears its graceful head far into 
the clouds, the living ambassador from a grateful people to the borders 
of the undiscovered country, to which both soldiers have gone — Wash- 
ington and Grant ! The warriors of liberty ! One its father, and the 
other its latest defender. 

Fellow-citizens ! a chill autumn wind, blowing over a sterile plain, 
bore within its arms a little seed, torn with ruthless force from its ma- 
trix on a lofty tree, and dropped the seed upon the sand to perish. A 
bright-winged beetle, weary with flight and languid with the chilly air, 
rested for a moment upon the arid plain. The little seed, dropped by 
^Eolus, served to satisfy the hunger of the beetle, which presently winged 
its flight to the margin of a swift-running brook that had sprung from 
the mountain-side and, cleaving a bed through rocks of granite, went 
gayly laughing upon its cheery way down to the ever-rolling sea. Sip- 
ping a drop of the crystal flood, the beetle crawled within a protecting 
ledge, and, folding its wings, lay down to pleasant dreams. The Ice 
King passed along and touched the insect in its sleep. Its mission was 
fulfilled ; but the conflict of the seasons continued until the White De- 
stroyer melted in the breath of balmy spring. And then a sunbeam 
sped to the chink wherein the body of the insect lay, and searching for 
the little seed entombed but not destroyed, invited it to "join the jubi- 
lee of returning life and hope." Under the soft wooing of the peopled 
ray, the little seed began to swell with joy, tiny rootlets were developed 
within the body of the protecting beetle, a minute stem shot out of its 
gaping mouth, and, lo ! a mighty tree had been carried from the desert, 
saved from the frosts of winter, nurtured and started upon its mission 
of life and usefulness by an humble insect that had perished with the 
flowers. The agent had passed away ; but building better than he knew, 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 427 

the wide-spreading tree remained by the margin of the life-giving brook, 
a shelter and a rest to the weary traveller upon life's great highwav, 
through many fretful centuries. A child, abandoned by its mother to 
perish in an Egyptian marsh, may become the instrument to deliver a 
nation from bondage, and an unostentatious man, unknown to fortune 
and to fame, may become the agent of a mighty work, destined to bene- 
fit the human race as long as it may last upon the earth. 

Oh ! mighty agent of a grateful people, we are here to do you honor. 
Oh ! inspired genius, we come to render testimony of the beneficence 
of your work. Noble citizen, kind husband, loving father, good friend, 
great captain, chosen agent ! the work thou hast done will shine from 
the firmament as a new star to light the coming generations. Its ray 
shall pale the rich troopers of the night, and forever flash with undi- 
minished fire in presence of the god of day. Until another year shall 
reawaken the flowers and fill the vernal air with incense, we leave 
thee with the faithful spirits that guard thy rest and smile about thy 
tomb. 

the payne senatorial election case halstead's attack 

on logan — logan's spirited rejoinder. 

Allegations having been made that Senator Payne of 
Ohio had secured his election to the United States Senate 
by improper and corrupt means, and testimony having been 
presented to prove it, the matter was referred to the appro- 
priate committee of the Senate, which subsequently reported 
that it was insufficient to warrant an investigation of the 
charge. Senators Logan, Evarts, and Teller were of the 
majority of the committee making the report. For his action 
in this matter, attacks were made upon Logan by many of the 
newspapers — inspired, evidently, by influences which feared 
his growing popularity everywhere before the people, in the 
hope of crippling his chances for the Presidential nomination 
in 1888 — when the report was up, for consideration, in the 
Senate. In the debate which took place upon it, in that body, 
July 21, 1886, Senator Hoar undertook to show that the tes- 
timony taken by the Ohio Legislature and forwarded to the 
Senate committee warranted an investigation. 

Logan immediately took the floor, and made a powerful 



428 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



reply to the attacks made upon him by a portion of the press 
— especially by Halstead in the Cincinnati Commercial- 
Gazette. He said, at the outset, that the Senator from 
Massachusetts (Mr. Hoar) had used garbled statements for 
the purpose of securing outside prejudice in this case ; that 
there was nothing in the testimony that proved charges which 
had been made against four members of the Ohio Legis- 
lature ; that the Ohio Legislature had sent this "mass of 
rubbish " to the Senate in manuscript, and it had been 
printed for the first time by order of the Senate ; that there 
was not in this evidence a single iota of testimony impli- 
cating Mr. Payne, directly or indirectly. " And this is the 
character of testimony " said Logan, scornfully, "upon which 
we three men [Logan, Evarts, and Teller,] as good Repub- 
licans as the Senator from Massachusetts, shall be heralded 
all over the land as having sacrificed principle ! When it 
comes to that," he continued, "when it comes to throwing 
mud at members of the party, I will defend myself here, and 
elsewhere, and I hurl back in the teeth of these men what 
they may say against me. I have been threatened and 
warned, but I would rather be right, than to have all the 
offices or compliments that could be bestowed upon me." 
No wonder his audience, as he said this, broke into applause ! 
When the plaudits of the sympathizing galleries had 
ceased, Senator Logan continued : 

The first thing that was said after this decision was arrived at by the 
committee, was a telegram to various newspapers all over the country, 
that Logan had requested the committee to keep the vote secret. That 
went to a certain character of papers in this country. Why was that 
said about me ? There is not a man on the face of God's earth who 
ever heard me request secrecy in relation to any act of a public char- 
acter that I ever performed. The members of the committee know that 
that was a lie, and the chairman of the committee telegraphed through 
the Associated Press that there was no foundation at all for the state- 
ment. I would like to know why that statement was made ? Why 
should I be singled out over other Senators and have suspicion cast 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 429 

upon me ? It was done just as many things have been done since then. 
It seems to be thought that now is the time to kill off Republicans. . . . 
There is a newspaper in the country known as the Cincinnati Commer- 
cial-Gazette. Some friends whisper to me "Logan, you had better let 
the Commercial-Gazette alone," but I am going to read from it, and am 
going to use it as evidence against myself. The Cincinnati Gazette is a 
very influential paper, a very powerful paper. Nobody disputes that. 
It is owned and edited (and has been for a long time) by a man named 
Halstead. . . . Halstead, as I say, is an influential man. In the days 
of Abraham Lincoln, Halstead thought that Lincoln's head ought to be 
churned against the wall and his brains knocked out, or something like 
that. That was complimentary to Lincoln. In 1863, Halstead thought 
that Grant was a drunken old loafer, who ought to be kicked out of 
society. That was complimentary to Grant. After Grant was elected 
President, Halstead thought that he was a dirty, corrupt old scoundrel, 
who was not to be trusted by the people of the country. So, in 1872, 
Halstead supported Greeley for the Presidency against Grant, because 
Grant was not a man to be trusted ! I came to the Senate, here, almost 
accidentally, and the first thing I knew, when I got here, I picked up 
the Cincinnati Commercial, one day, and found five columns of that 
paper charging my friend [Mr. Sherman] from Ohio, who presides so 
honorably and fairly over this body, with all sorts of things. The article 
was written from Washington City, and published with great head-lines, 
to show that our friend, Senator Sherman, was a dishonorable, corrupt 
man, who ought not to be trusted anywhere, on account of some kind 
of devilment that he had with quartermasters during the war. The 
next thing that I found in the Cincinnati Commercial was that James G. 
Blaine was a scoundrel, a thief, and a villain, who should be executed 
at the nearest lamp-post. I did not believe it about Blaine ; I did not 
believe it about Sherman ; I did not believe it about Grant ; and I did 
not believe it about Lincoln. I did not think that I was a big enough 
fellow ever to be attacked by the Cincinnati Commercial, and I never 
dreamed of such a thing, but I soon found it pitching in against some 
other people (it is not necessary for me to mention names). But the 
other day, I picked it up, and, to my utter astonishment, found my 
name mentioned in it in a complimentary way, in connection with the 
names of two other Senators who are greater men than myself. Hal- 
stead is the man who got up this case, by first publishing all these 
Donovan charges, and he says, speaking in a very kind manner of the 
Senator from New York [Evarts], the Senator from Colorado [Teller], 
and myself, that all the arts of corrupt schemers, and all the blandish- 
ments of millions, have been brought to bear upon us ! 



43 o LIFE OF LOGAN. 

Senator Logan here quoted from the Cincinnati Commer- 
cial-Gazette an article against himself and Senators Evarts 
and Teller, speaking of Mr. Evarts as a representative of 
coal-oil in the Senate, and as to Teller, he wasn't worth 
talking about. " The Presidential boom," the article con- 
tinued, "of two distinguished Republican United States 
Senators can now be tenderly laid away to eternal rest." 
That (said Mr. Logan, addressing Mr. Evarts) means 
yourself and the Senator from Ohio, Mr. Sherman. [Laugh- 
ter.] It cannot allude to anybody else. , 

General Logan declared that these three members of the 
committee " whom Halstead attempted to bully, he could not 
bully, and he need not try it. He (Logan) would sink in his 
place before he would be driven by Halstead, or anybody 
else, to do an act which would be ungenerous, unkind, and 
unlawful, in order merely that he might become the pet of 
somebody for a month or two and then be kicked afterward. 
In conclusion, he said that he had been actuated in this 
matter, not by impulse, not by being aggrieved, not by 
attacks, but by a calm and deliberate examination of the tes- 
timony and of the law in the case. He had done his duty 
and would stand by it, for his action was right, and just, and 
proper." 

He concluded amid great applause on the floor and in the 
galleries. 

LOGAN GOES TO THE G. A. R. ENCAMPMENT AT SAN FRANCISCO, 

!886 IS ENTHUSIASTICALLY RECEIVED EVERYWHERE ON THE 

PACIFIC COAST HIS RETURN. 

Toward the latter end of July, 1886, General Logan with 
his wife left Washington for Chicago and, by invitation pro- 
ceeded thence — in the private car of Governor Alger of 
Michigan — across the continent, to visit the Pacific States. 
The trip through Nebraska, according to the correspondent 
of the lutcr-Occan, was "a constant succession of pleas- 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 431 

ant surprises and receptions." At Denver, and other points 
in Colorado, the General was received with great empress- 
ment. So also at all other points, where he stopped. The 
route travelled on this grand trip, according to the same 
authority, was from Chicago to Omaha over the Northwest- 
ern; to San Francisco over the Union Pacific and Central 
Pacific ; then to Napa Valley and through Nevada. Side 
trips were taken over the various branches of the Central and 
Southern Pacific, and over the Donahue Road into the famous 
Red Woods. From San Francisco to Portland, Ore., via 
the Central Pacific they went to a point twelve miles beyond 
Hazel Creek, Cal, the northern terminus of the tracks, then 
one hundred miles by stage to Ashland, Ore., and thence 
north via the California & Oregon Railroad. From Portland 
to Tacoma and Seattle, Wash. Ter., and return, they went 
via the Northern Pacific. They also made an extended trip 
up Puget Sound in the steamers Meriom and Idaho. The 
return home was by the Oregon Railway and Navigation, 
Northern Pacific, and Northwestern Roads. This is the skele- 
ton outline of the trip, which covered six weeks' time, sixteen 
States and Territories, and " over 8,500 miles of travel." 

"The prime object of the trip," says the same authority, 
" was to attend the Grand Army Encampment at San Fran- 
cisco, and also see and learn as much of the Pacific coast and 
its interests as was possible in the time allowed. The party 
visited the principal cities and resorts of the Pacific coast, 
and, at every point, the people turned out en masse to welcome 
them. The receptions were always most largely attended, 
and the utmost enthusiasm was manifested by the people on 
the coast, over the visit. To General Logan the trip was full 
of interest. He devoted his attention to the great questions 
which are of vital importance to the Pacific coast people. He 
was called on to make frequent speeches, and his responses 
were always eloquent, in the best taste, fitting to the time 
and place, and free from political allusions. . . . The 



A ^ LIFE OF LOGAN. 

private cars were kept loaded with fruit and flowers and vari- 
ous other mementoes of the places visited." 

The limits of this book preclude more than a very few 
references to the many notable things seen and heard during 
this memorable trip, which the General himself told the writer 
was one of the most instructive and delightful of his life. 
But there are some things that should not be passed over. 
One is the grand reception given to the General at the 
Pavilion in Salt Lake City. It was crowded to its utmost 
capacity, and when replying to Governor Eli H. Murray's 
address of welcome, General Logan, in the course of a long 
and. eloquent and statesmanlike speech on the Mormon ques- 
tion, said some notable things— bearding the lion in his den, 
as it were. For instance, he said to the people assembled, 
plentifully sprinkled as they were with Mormons : 

A State government inside of the United States Government is 
merely a government without sovereignty as exercised by the Nation, 
but with certain rights that they enjoy under the Constitution, and with 
which rights the Government itself does not interfere, where they do not 
come in conflict with the laws of the Nation. [Applause.] Certain 
rights are given to them, which they may exercise within certain pre- 
scribed rules and limits. Whenever they go beyond that, the Nation 
has power itself to prevent and stop it, and it is its duty to do it. [Ap- 
plause.] So then, churches may be organized in any part of the coun- 
try, if they are churches which violate no law ; but a theocracy, which 
exercises legislative, judicial, and executive functions inside of the 
Government for the purpose of overthrowing the rules, laws, and 
Constitution of the Government— it cannot exist. [Loud applause.] 

Later on, in the same great speech, General Logan said : 

Now, then, it is a question whether or not the laws of the United 
States shall be enforced over every foot of the American soil. [Ap- 
plause.] I say for myself, yes. [Applause.] And if you have in this, 
or any other place you love, institutions that are in conflict with the 
laws of this Nation, the laws themselves must fall, or your institutions 
must go down. [Applause.] And it seems to me it would not require 
a very great exercise of common-sense to see which one would be 
superior, when these ideas come in conflict. [Applause.] It may not 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 433 

be done in a moment. People who fail to believe in the laws may re- 
sist for a time, but if your Government is determined with reference to 
any subject to enforce the laws and preserve its institutions, it is only a 
question of time when you have got to succumb to the laws and the 
force of the same. [Applause.] 

In order to emphasize his position on this Mormon ques- 
tion, and drive it well home to the convictions of his hearers, 
he said, later on : 

If citizens of this country despise this Government, and hate its laws, 
they must either submit to them or leave. One or the other. [Ap- 
plause.] It is the duty of the courts of all countries to enforce the laws by 
their decrees. It is the duty of the Executive department of the Gov- 
ernment to execute the laws ; it is the duty of all officers to execute 
them, as well as the duty of citizens to submit to them. And I say to 
you now, that you may resist for a time, and it is only for a time ; for 
somebody, sometime or other, or some people, or some class of people, 
will have control of this Government who will enforce its laws.. [Ap- 
plause.] 

And, in concluding a reference to his speedy return to the 
East, he feelingly and eloquently said : 

I shall remember that in Utah, in Salt Lake City, we received one 
of the grandest receptions and greetings that met us anywhere in all 
our travels, and I shall be glad to take this back East, and tell the peo- 
ple that in Utah there are loyal American citizens [long-continued ap- 
plause] ; that in Utah there are people who love the institutions of this 
country ; that in Utah there are, perhaps, a third or fourth of the citi- 
zens who believe in good government ; that here are people, and many 
good people, too, who believe in the laws of our country ; and who believe 
in their enforcement. All they want is the proper encouragement, and 
the proper course pursued, by the central Government, so that they them- 
selves may bring Utah up to the standard of this Republic, and we may 
proudly say : there is not one blot now on the proud escutcheon of this 
great American Nation, all the dark spots have been blotted out ; it 
shines to-day like the glorious, majestic king above us, that reflects its 
light and glory upon the footstool of man. [Applause.] 

Nor would it do to pass without especial mention the 

manner in which San Francisco received her honored guests 

— as gathered from her daily journals. Said the Alta, August 
28 



4 34 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

4, 1886 : " Many years from to-day, when the little children 
who yesterday viewed the grandest parade which ever passed 
through the streets of this city recall to mind the scenes and 
incidents of that event, it will be with feelings of pride and 
patriotism. No one could have viewed that long line of 
veterans with their tattered battle-flags, and not have felt 
a glow of patriotic enthusiasm. The people, who gathered 
along the line of march in countless thousands, were not 
backward in their expressions of loyalty ; and it must have 
been a proud day for General Logan and General Sherman, 
who both received such a greeting all along the route as only 
Grant received before them seven years ago." 

There were no less than seven divisions, comprising ten 
thousand men, in this daylight parade, and foremost in the 
double line of carriages in the first division, rode Governor 
Stoneman, Mayor Bartlett, General Sherman, and General 
Logan; and, says one of the reports, "Just before Generals 
Sherman and Logan reached that part of Market Street 
between Fifth and Sixth, a party of young ladies, all armed 
with baskets of flowers, invaded the street, charged the 
moving column, and began a fusillade of roses — strewing the 
pavement with flowers for Generals Sherman and Logan to 
pass over." 

At night there was another procession amid brilliant 
pyrotechnics, to escort the distinguished guests to the huge 
Mechanics' Pavilion, where there was assembled a great 
gathering to welcome them. Both Sherman and Logan re- 
sponded to the welcoming speeches there made, and after- 
ward, says the Bulletin, " a rush was made to speak with 
Generals Sherman and Logan, who shook hands with many 
citizens." On the following night, Logan was present at the 
grand Festival Concert given to the Grand Army dignitaries, 
in Mechanics' Pavilion, where there was a terrible crush- — ■ 
20,000 people striving to enter ! " At the end of the first 
part of the programme," says the Alia, " there was an inter- 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 435 

mission of about five minutes. Cries arose for Logan, from 
the front of the audience. The General was observed seated 
at the northwest corner of the floor-chairs, and the calls of 
his admirers growing louder each instant, he was prevailed 
upon, by the Committee of Management of the G. A. R., to 
ascend the chorus-platform, escorted by Colonel J. M. Davis 
of the committee. Instantly the audience rose as one man, 
and cheered the General in a most enthusiastic manner. This 
was, however, as nothing compared to the ovation he received 
while bowing his acknowledgments on the stage. The 
young ladies of the chorus began to throw little bouquets at 
him, and it was not many seconds before a perfect rain of 
flowers fell all over Logan's head and shoulders. He stood 
the o-ood-natured bombardment for a minute or two, while 
his admirers yelled themselves hoarse, and then he descended 
and resumed his seat. At two other points in the pro- 
gramme, fresh cries were made for Logan, but he was unwill- 
ing to again appear." 

During his brief stay in San Francisco, several receptions 
and banquets were given to the General. He also ran over 
to the Red Woods, and with Governor Alger cut down a 
giant red-wood tree. At Oakland, Alameda County, there 
was another grand parade of the Grand Army, and in the 
afternoon and evening, further receptions to General Logan. 
In fact, wherever he appeared "the enthusiasm was intense." 
So also at Sacramento, and through Napa Valley ; and, when 
Logan's party made a short trip to Nevada and back, at 
Carson and Virginia City, it was the same. There seemed 
to be no limit to his popularity. The enthusiasm was 
tireless, everywhere — and Mrs. Logan shared in it. At 
last the Logan party left Oakland, by rail and stage, for 
Oregon — and along the line, at all the stations, Logan's train 
was received by shouting crowds, with " bands playing and 
banners flying," and with flowers. At some of the towns, 
Logan was also saluted with booming cannon. At Portland, 



4 „ 6 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

Ore., and at Seattle and Tacoma, Wash. Ter., Logan was 
also royally welcomed. In short there was, during the entire 
trip, apparently, no end of receptions, banquets, parades, 
rejoicings, and enthusiastic excitement wherever the General 
appeared. Everywhere Logan received a royal welcome, 
which showed how deeply attached these loyal Pacific 
coasters were to the warrior-statesman. And when Logan 
returned to Chicago, he was able to say that he had visited 
every State, and most of the Territories, of the Union. 

logan's return — receptions at st. paul, Minneapolis, and 

CHICAGO. 

Coming back from his Pacific coast trip, General Logan 
reached St. Paul, Minn., September I, 1886, and visited Min- 
neapolis. A grand reception likewise met him there. The 
Union League also banqueted him, and his speech On this 
occasion, with "The Republican Party" as his text, covered 
the political issues of the day, and was received with un- 
bounded applause throughout, and "three ringing cheers" 
at its close. On the 4th he reached Chicago again, and an- 
other fine reception in his honor was given at the Grand 
Pacific — the Tribune saying of it : " General Logan's return 
yesterday to Chicago was made the occasion of a public 
reception in the evening. The attendance was large and 
truly representative. It was by no means the rally of hench- 
men about their chief, but a gathering of reputable Repub- 
licans to welcome home the distinguished Senator who is 
fairly entitled to all the honor bestowed upon him. He might 
well be proud of the recognition, especially as it was a fair 
expression of public sentiment. . . . This reception was an 
assurance that if General Logan wants to be nominated for 
President in 1888, he can have the solid delegation from 
Illinois, and that without a struggle." 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 437 



LOGAN AT ROCK ISLAND — SPEECH AGAINST LIMITING THE SUF- 
FRAGE HIS GREAT SPEECH AT PITTSBURG, PA. 

At Rock Island, 111., September 14th, Logan having 
heard the oration of General Chetlain before the Society of 
the Army of the Tennessee, and being loudly called for, 
stepped forward in Harper's Theatre amid loud and enthusi- 
astic cheering, and launched into an impassioned speech of 
denunciation of the position of that orator, that " a cure for 
our labor troubles would be the establishment of a limited 
franchise, based on a property qualification." Logan de- 
nounced such a doctrine as being the first step toward mon- 
archy. He showed that from the beginning of this nation its 
liberties had first been gained, and since then had been pre- 
served, by the poor men of the country. " The fact that our 
starry banner was borne by patriotic hands," said General 
Logan, " though they came from the plough-handle and every 
avocation of life, causes me to reflect that patriotism dwells 
in the cabin as well as in the castle, and I desire to say, that 
the evils that are now upon this glorious country, which has 
been preserved by the 2,225,000 of men who went forth to 
save the nation for us, are slight, and the remedy is not in 
disfranchising the poor man. It is in the execution of the laws 
of the country against every man who violates them, no mat- 
ter whether he be rich or poor. [Applause.] ... I do 
not believe in the doctrine that because a man is a poor man 
he shall not vote. That is the doctrine of the oligarchists of 
the South who stamped their slaves under foot because they 
were black, and since they were made free have denied them 
all the privileges of free men. Do you think Grant could 
have paid taxes when he was made colonel of his regiment. 
[Applause.] There are few poorer men in the United States 
than he was then. Lincoln, when he 'was twenty-one years 
old, could not have voted, under this doctrine. I say these 



4<5 8 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

things because I do not wish it to go out that we all agree 
that because a man is not a taxpayer, he shall not vote. 
[Long applause.] 

On September 25th, General Logan made another great 
speech, before six thousand persons at Music Hall, Pittsburg, 
Pa. It was largely devoted to a consideration of the tariff 
question, and evoked great enthusiasm and applause from the 
assembled multitude. In fact, his appearance, "created un- 
bounded enthusiasm," at the very start, "and for five minutes 
he could not speak for the cheering." 

logan's speech at the soldiers' reunion at cairo, Sep- 
tember 30, 1886— THE TRUE THEORY OF PENSIONS — ELO- 
QUENT PASSAGES. 

On September 30th, General Logan was at the Soldiers' 
Reunion at Cairo, 111., and made an impressive and elo- 
quent address, in the course of which he said to the vet- 
erans : 

I say you are entitled to credit, not only for saving this nation, but 
for inspiring a genius and energy that has made this the greatest Gov- 
ernment that civilized man has the right to control. [Applause.] And 
when I say you are entitled to credit, I mean that the soldier is entitled 
to the greater share of the credit for the greatness of this Republic to- 
day ; for preserving this nation as a whole. [Applause.] You are en- 
titled to credit because you tore down one flag to keep up the other ; 
you destroyed one constitution, made in opposition to your own, and pre- 
served your own. [Applause.] You are entitled to this credit because 
you swore in the light of Heaven that not one inch of the 3,000,000 
square miles that was beneath your flag should be governed under any- 
other flag. [Applause.] You are entitled to credit for the great ac- 
cumulations in this country. In 1880 we had accumulated $44,000,000,- 
000 of wealth instead of the $14,000,000,000 we had in i860, being an 
increase of $30,000,000,000 in twenty years, and, as I said, in this grand 
development of wealth, energy, and knowledge, citizens followed in your 
wake. You are entitled to the greater credit for this splendid advance- 
ment. [Applause.] We hear it said that the soldiers are getting too 
many pensions. Well, now let us see. We had 2,225,000 men in the 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 439 

army. Is there a man with common-sense who believes that with an 
army of 2,225,000 men, who served on an average of three years, in 
swamps, on rivers, in sunshine, storm, in battle and in prison-pen, the 
pension-roll could be very small ? Our loss was nearly 300,000 killed, 
wounded, missing, and captive. 

The true theory of pensions is this — every man who was wounded 
or injured, or contracted disease in line of duty, by the law is entitled 
to a pension. Now then, if the law gives him a pension, and you made 
the law when the army was proceeding south, I want to know why com- 
plaint is made now ? And I want to ask if you ever heard anyone com- 
plain of the pension-roll when the war was going on ? [Applause.] The 
complaint was not made then ; men do not forget the hand that snatches 
them from the burning fire. My countrymen, I have made this state- 
ment before, and I will repeat it wherever I go. I marched down Penn- 
sylvania Avenue on the 22d of May, 1865, at the head of 65,000 men 
carrying muskets, and as we marched past the Capitol, on that Capitol, 
was stretched a canvas bearing these words : 

"THERE IS ONE DEBT THE GOVERNMENT CAN NEVER PAY, AND* 
THAT IS THE DEBT OF GRATITUDE IT OWES TO ITS SOLDIERS." 

[Applause.] That was the sentiment of this country then. If it was- 
good then, why is it not now ? If it was true then, why not now ? If 
it was right then, why not now ? But, my countrymen, I go further tham 
this. Some men say, pension everybody. I have nothing to say about 
that. The time will come when all will be pensioned according to the- 
rule that governed in the case of the Revolutionary veterans and those 
of the War of 1812. My plan is to pension every soldier who is disabled,, 
whether in the service or out of it ; whether he was injured by a bullet 
or by a threshing-machine. He Avas a sound man when he went into- 
the service, and he is now disabled, and his Government should protect 
and care for him when he cannot take care of himself. There are- 
hundreds of men who were wounded who are unable to make proof 
required by the law. I would pension this class. [Applause.] I will 
only say this, — the reason why this law has not been passed can. probably 
be explained by somebody else. It has passed one branch, of Congress 
twice. Why it has not passed the other branch I leave to that branch 
to explain. [Laughter and applause.] Let me go a little further. I 
am a plain man, and came from a plain people, and being a plain man 
I say what I believe, and I will tell you what I do believe. From 
George Washington down and through the administration of President 
Arthur, all the presidents sent one hundred and ten veto-messages to 
Congress. But these men were old fogies ; they did not understand 



44 o LIFE OF LOGAN. 

things — they were not soldiers. What did Washington and Grant 
know about soldiers? Now we have a man comprehending all the 
affairs of mankind ; we have accidentally found a genius that vetoes one 
hundred and two pension-bills at one session of Congress. [Cries of 
" hit him again ! " Now somebody will say Logan is talking politics. 
[Laughter.] There is no politics in that, but there is lots of " cussed- 
ness." [Laughter and applause.] 



There is a duty for us all to perform in a government like this 
where we claim that the will of the people rules ; where we claim that 
the rights of all citizens are equal. We have put this in our Constitu- 
tion, and we have sworn to obey that Constitution, and this Govern- 
ment will never be the government God intended it should be, until 
every man is allowed to enjoy the rights that the Constitution and laws 
of this country give him, no matter where he may be. [Applause.] 

Now then, soldiers, you and I, and all of us together, can do much 
in this direction ; we can do much for one another ; we can do much to 
secure the rights of citizens ; all is not gone by the board ; we have 
faith in our country, and love for the glory of our Government, and 
affection for our flag, and we have patriotism that causes us to devote 
ourselves to the freedom of this land. And while we journey along this 
life we will touch elbows and march along, keeping step to the music 
of the Union. [Applause.] We will so keep advanced this idea of a 
free government and a Christian civilization ; and let us be a great living 
power. Let us build up this Government in all that makes a country 
great, and in doing this let us believe that there is no glory in govern- 
ment like the glory that is given forth from a free republic. Let us be- 
lieve there is no flag like the flag of this nation. Let us be determined 
that the seas shall be whitened by the sails of an American navy. [Ap- 
plause.] When we look upon that flag, let us swear by it ; let us re- 
member that those white stripes represent the purity of this great 
people, and every red stripe represents the blood that has been poured 
out to water the roots of the tree of liberty, the fruit of which we have 
all tasted. [Applause.] Let us remember that those stars embodied 
in that blue ground, represent the blue vault of heaven whose stars 
shine out to light up the footstool of God. [Applause. "| Let us re- 
member that each star on this flag is in its place, and kept there by you 
and your comrades, and there will remain forever. My comrades, glory 
shines along the path we are following. Let us feel that these stars 
give out a brilliancy that dims in its glory the very stars that deck the 
plains of heaven. [Applause.] 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 441 



logan's last great out-door public address, at marion, 
october 4, l886 — " the issues of the day " the demo- 
cratic party a failure — the republican party vindi- 
CATED. 

At Marion, 111., Logan addressed an immense assemblage of 
his fellow-citizens, October 4, 1886, upon " The Issues of the 
Day." It was his last great out-door public speech, and he 
handled the subjects in his usual masterly manner. It was 
largely devoted to an historical review of tariff legislation in 
this country, from the first organization of our National Gov- 
ernment, and contrasting the immeasurable ruin that befell 
American industries whenever, under Democratic rule, free- 
trade was permitted, and the boundless prosperity that fol- 
lowed when, under Republican rule, a protective tariff was 
adopted and adhered to. This position he fortified with 
abundant statistics. Then, turning his attention to Demo- 
cratic promises, made in 1884, to run the Government econom- 
ically if the people would only "turn the rascals out," Logan 
continued : 

You heard it said that we had accumulated $400,000,000 in the 
Treasury. "Turn the rascals out, and let us divide this money. It 
will buy two barrels of flour for every man, woman, and child in the 
United States." You turned the "rascals" out, and when you examined, 
you could not find a five-cent piece missing. I do not say it will not be 
so when the Democrats go out, in 1889. I hope they will have as clean 
a record. But what about the division of the $400,000,000 ? How has 
it been divided, will anyone say ? The Democrats promised to run the 
Government economically if they got in. They have got in, and what 
have they done ? Let us see. They have been in power nearly two 
years. Now let me quote from the Congressional Record. In 1884, 
1885, 1886, the appropriations for running the Government were, 
$338,000,343.31 ; $35i,33S,595-i7 5 $329,864,620.04, respectively. They 
were the last years of Republican rule. The Democracy have had just 
one " whack " at it. The estimate sent to Congress by this administra- 
tion was $406,583,447.24. This was what the President asked for, just to 



442 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

pay the running expenses of the Government. The Senate concluded 
this was too much, but the Secretary of the Treasury wrote a letter and 
said he could not get along with any less. We appropriated for this ad- 
ministration $383,715,676.11, being $54,000,000 more than was expended 
by the Republican Party in 1885 and 1886. So it requires $54,000,000 
more for a Democratic administration to run the Government than it 
does for a Republican administration. What do you think it will re- 
quire in four years? Now, what is this money to be expended for, 
where is it going ? For nothing only to run the Government ! Fifty- 
four million dollars is a great deal of money — more than all of you 
have. If they had a war on their hands, there would not be enough 
money in the world to supply them. It is a good thing we did not get 
into a war with poor Mexico, on account of that drunken fellow they 
had in prison. 

Senator Logan then proceeded to contrast the Republi- 
can and Democratic parties to the disadvantage of the latter, 
with respect to their action upon soldiers' pension bills, and 
especially as exhibited by the votes in Congress on the bill 
pensioning disabled soldiers of the Mexican War, as amended 
by the Senate so as to include disabled soldiers of the War 
of the Rebellion. He also riddled Morrison's proposition to 
tack on to every pension bill a proviso to collect the money 
therein appropriated by a direct tax. And, touching the pecul- 
iar favoritism shown by the Democratic administration to 
ex-Confederates, he said : 

While I speak of this administration, and I speak kindly of it, — Mr. 
Cleveland has always treated me kindly, — I say this, he has done for us 
what no other President has done or any other will do, in my judgment. 
Out of all the countries, China, Japan, England, Germany, Russia, 
France, and Spain, and all others, he has found, I believe, about five 
men to send abroad who were not in the Confederate army. We are 
represented at every foreign court, except about five, by men who at- 
tempted to destroy the Union. We are represented at Japan by the 
keeper of Libby Prison, Mr. Hubbard. Now, I say I object. 

Logan also gave the Democratic Party a broadside touch- 
ing the allegation made by Democratic orators that " the Re- 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 443 

publican Party has squandered the public land and given it to 
the railroads." Said he : 

The first grant of land was given to the Illinois Central Railroad by 
a Democratic Congress, and advocated by Stephen A. Douglas, — the 
richest grant of land that was ever given to a railroad in the world. 
The Democrats started it, and it was kept up ; and in i860 the Demo- 
cratic and Republican parties both had platform-declarations in favor of 
the grant to the Union Pacific Railroad ; and when that grant was given, 
both parties voted for it. I was not in Congress at the time, but if I had 
been, I should probably have voted with the rest. But let me say this 
to you, instead of the Republican Party robbing the people, I ask any 
Democrat, when did his party ever give a foot of land to a poor man in 
this country ? When the buffalo had possession of the country west of the 
Mississippi River, Buchanan, the last Democratic President, vetoed the 
bill giving this land to poor people as homesteads, and it was left for 
the Republican Party to pass a bill, signed by Abraham Lincoln, giving 
homesteads to the poor people. So, when these people accuse the Re- 
publican party, they had better look at their own history. If they had 
been in power instead of the Republican Party, homesteads would 
never have been voted. 

After proving in various ways that the Democratic Party 
is a failure, and vindicating the Republican Party from these 
Democratic attacks, Senator Logan concluded with an elo- 
quent peroration, amid long-continued plaudits. 

GENERAL LOGAN'S LAST CAMP-FIRE SPEECH, AT THE OPERA- 
HOUSE, YOUNGSTOWN, O., NOVEMBER 1 8, 1 886. 

In the opera-house, at Youngstown, O., General Logan 
made his last G. A. R. camp-fire speech, November 18, 1886. 
It was humorous in spots, but breathed throughout its rugged 
eloquence that intense patriotism which characterizes all his 
speeches. Logan concluded it in these words : 

I want to say but one thing in conclusion. It is this : I care not how 
much people may talk about these meetings. I care not what kind of 
criticisms they may pass upon them. They are the best schools this 
Government has ever had. The meeting of these soldiers, and their 



444 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

inarching on the streets, and the demonstration they make before the 
youth of this country, furnish a lesson they can learn nowhere else ; 
and, in the last few years, by holding such meetings all over this land, 
you have relit, in the slumbering hearts of the people of this country, 
the old fires of patriotism that burned beautifully and brightly long ago. 
You find, to-day, the lesson you are teaching the children, the young men, 
and the young ladies, everywhere recognized ; even the little boy takes 
his little flag of stars and stripes, and, proud of it, sticks it in the fence, 
in the gate, or in the window, anywhere, knowing that it is the flag of 
his country, — learning it from the fact that when these meetings come 
about in the land, the flag is seen put out everywhere. The child says to 
its mother, " Mother, why is the flag put out of that window ? " And then 
the child is taught that it is out of respect to those patriots who fought 
for their country ; and thus you teach the lesson to the youth of the land 
and they follow you as the boys did to-day— follow you wherever you 
go. Then, comrades, let these meetings go on. Meet whenever you 
can. Teach the youth of the land that patriotism is worth more than 
gold. I say to the ladies here to-night, and the gentlemen— all who 
were not soldiers — that this lesson is one that shall not be lost, and if in 
the future, our country should happen to be in trouble again, you will 
find it then bearing fruit ; for the youth of the land, following their 
fathers, uncles, and friends, before them, will march to the music of the 
Union, and our flag shall float forever o'er land and o'er sea, and be re- 
spected in every land, by every man, woman, and child, in the civilized 
world. [Loud and continued applause.] 



logan's magazine work — book-making — "the great con- 
spiracy." 

During the last two years of General Logan's life, despite 
the immense amount and variety of his other labors — whether 
upon the stump, in the Senate Chamber, in committees, at 
the departments of the Government, or in his frequent long 
journeyings, and prodigious correspondence by mail— his won- 
derfully active mind was more or less occupied with the pro- 
jection and execution of purely literary work. Thus, there 
successively appeared over his signature during that time, 
various exhaustive magazine articles in the Chatauquan, on 
Education — a subject in which he was greatly interested — on 



LOGAN SINCE 1884. 445 

General Grant, soon after the lamented death of the latter ; 
and also a book, entitled " The Great Conspiracy," which in- 
volved not alone the entire history of this Nation, from the 
beginning down to the Reconstruction period, — including a 
full epitome of the famous Political Debates between Lincoln 
and Douglas, — but also attempted to prove, and succeeded in 
proving, that the Great Conspiracy, which culminated in the 
attempted secession, and open, armed-rebellion, of banded 
Southern States, had its rise in the early days of the Repub- 
lic, and was originally fomented, and subsequently grew to the 
enormous proportions which almost wrecked the Nation, by 
the combined efforts of Southern free-traders, whose real 
objective point was not so much the preservation of human 
slavery as the accomplishment of their free-trade designs. 
This last work brought to him great reputation as an historian, 
and, doubtless, had he lived, would have been followed by 
other volumes. But death put an end to whatever ambitions 
he may have had in the distinctive paths of literature which 
he seems to have chosen, no less than in those others of po- 
litical and legislative activity to which he had devoted so many 
of the best years of his life, and in which he was always so 
prominent a figure. It is quite probable, indeed, that Lo- 
gan's valuable life was shortened by the drudgery and annoy- 
ances incident to the proof-reading of "The Great Conspir- 
acy," and to disappointments connected with its publication 
and sale, which, added to all his other greater cares, anxieties, 
industries, and responsibilities, were " the straws which broke 
the camel's back." 

HIS RETURN TO THE NATIONAL CAPITOL LOGAN'S PRESIDENTIAL 

STAR WAXING RAPIDLY. 



All this time, Logan's Presidential star continued waxing 
brighter. Journal after journal in the Western States espe- 
cially, but also in many of the Eastern and Middle States, 



446 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

hoisted his name to their " mast-heads " as their choice for the 
Republican nomination for President in 1888. Besides this, 
there was much favorable talk among the politicians every- 
where on the subject. On March 12, 1886, even the New 
York Sun permitted its Washington correspondence to say : 
" If the opinion of politicians who made Washington their 
headquarters during the sessions of Congress could prevail 
at the next Republican National Convention, John A. Logan 
would be the candidate of the party. He has undoubtedly 
gained strength among the leaders, some of whom have hith- 
erto been accustomed to sneer at his pretentions to the Presi- 
dency." But to attempt to give all that was said from that 
time down, in all the journals of the land, favoring Logan for 
the Presidential nomination, would almost fill a volume. Suf- 
fice it to say that when Logan reached Washington to attend 
the Congressional session of 1886-87, his name was on almost 
every politician's tongue, as the "coming man," and, although 
he refused to say much on the subject even to his nearest 
friends, his mind could not have been entirely free from a joy- 
ous anticipation of yet reaching that supreme position as the 
elected ruler of sixty million of people, in which he would 
have had full scope for the display of his remarkable executive 
genius, and intense love of his country, its free institutions, 
and people. But alas ! it was not to be. All unknown to 
him, as well as to his friends, his days were numbered, and 
were even now fast drawing to a close. 



PART VI. 



LOGAN'S LAST DAYS AND DEATH. 

logan's return to Washington — his last drive — attacked 

by rheumatism his last appearance in the senate 

a siege of agony. 

Early in December, 1886, General Logan was back again 
in Washington, looking as well and sturdy as ever. On 
Saturday, the 4th, he took the writer with him in his daugh- 
ter's dog-cart, for an afternoon ride in the suburbs — the Gen- 
eral driving. It was a very cold ride from Calumet Place, 
northward along Thirteenth Street, around the northern limits 
of the Soldiers' Home Park, to Metropolis View, opposite 
Edgewood, — the residence of Mrs. Kate Sprague, — and 
down to the vicinity of the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad depot, 
where the writer parted from him. As we drove past Edge- 
wood the General remarked : " That is the place General 
Grant should have bought, and retired to, after his Presiden- 
tial term was up, instead of going to New York. It was just 
the place for him. He would have been happy there ; and, 
had he done so, I believe he would have been alive to-day." 
Little did either the General or the writer dream that this 
was the last time the former would ever drive out with a 
friend in this manner, or that in little over three weeks from 
then, Logan's own life would be rendered up. 

On the following Monday, the writer saw and talked with 
the General in his committee-room ;* and again on the suc- 
ceeding Tuesday. The next day, Wednesday, the writer 

* That on " Military Affairs." 



44 S LIFE OF LOGAN. 

met him in the corridor leading from the lower east door of 
the Senate wing of the Capitol to the General's committee- 
room, and, taking his arm, walked slowly with him. The 
General then limped slightly, and in reply to an inquiry said 
that he had a pain in his hip. " Sounds like sciatica," said 
the writer. " That's just what it is," the General responded. 
Otherwise, he seemed as well as ever. The next day, 
Thursday, December 9th, about 1 p.m., having business 
with him, the writer went to the east door of the Senate 
Chamber, and asked Captain John G. Merritt, in charge of 
that door, to tell Senator Logan that the writer would like to 
see him a few moments. The General soon came out, limp- 
ing, and, after a brief conversation returned to the Senate 
Chamber. This was the last time General Logan entered 
that Chamber alive.* 

For several successive days after this, the writer made 



* Captain Merritt,— himself an old Union soldier, crippled in the war,— has since told 
the writer that upon going into the Senate Chamber with the message, he found the General 
in the cloak-room on the Republican side of the Chamber, sitting on one chair, with his 
legs resting on another, smoking. What followed is thus told by Merritt : 

" I said to the General : ' Mr. Dawson desires me to say he would like to see you.' 
"At once, taking his cigar out of his mouth, and wincing with pain as he drew his legs 
off the chair, the General got up, and said : ' Where is he ? ; — and immediately commenced 
walking along the Senate floor to the door where you awaited him. 

" I noticed then that he limped as he walked, and said to him, —without dreaming that 
he was suffering as much as he must have been, — ' General, you must take care of yourself; 
we can't afford to have men like you get ill.' 

" Said he : 'With the pain I have, I cannot help limping.' 
"Then he passed out, and met you. 

"That." continued Merritt, with moistened eyes, "was the last time the old General 
ever came out to see anybody ; and now that he is gone, I feel a sort of mournful pride that 
to me the honor fell of calling him out of that Chamber for the last time." 

At the time of this conversation, the writer asked Captain Merritt, as there had been 
conflicting statements in the press as to the date of the General's last appearance in the 
Senate, to ascertain it definitely. The captain accordingly informs the writer as follows : 
"The day I called General Logan out of the Senate to see you, was Thursday, December 9, 
1886, about one o'clock, and that was the last time he was called out of the Senate to see 
anyone, and it was the last day he was in the Senate. The Senate on that day (December 
9th) adjourned over until the following Monday, December 13th, on which date the General 
was confined to his room at his home. He went home on the date mentioned about half- 
past two." 



LOGAN'S LAST DAYS AND DEATH. 



449 



inquiry touching the General's health, at the Military Com- 
mittee-room, but heard nothing from his secretaries that 
would awaken any apprehension of serious results. They 
mentioned that the General occasionally suffered great pain, 
and had restless nights in consequence of his rheumatism. 
The night of Wednesday, the 15th, was bitter cold, and a 
fierce snow-storm rao-ed. Fearing that such a ni^ht must 
have been especially severe on Logan, as his attacks of acute 
rheumatism were most active in such weather, the writer 
went to Calumet Place, Thursday forenoon, to make personal 
inquiries. He was at once invited upstairs, and found the 
General seated in his bedroom — his daughter Mrs. Tucker 
attending him, Mrs. Logan being busy with certain matters 
connected with a Fair for the benefit of the Garfield Memoriali 
Hospital, of which she was a manageress. To see him, sit- 
ting there, before a blazing fire, in an easy-chair, looking 
hearty and well, with nothing unusual about him save a 
swollen right hand, wrapped with cotton-batting, no one could: 
suppose for a moment that there was anything serious the- 
matter with the General. His voice was strong, his eyes, 
bright, and his manner alert as ever, and the writer could not 
help complimenting him on the fact, and adding that although 
the General had doubtless been through a siege of agony at 
times — an inevitable accompaniment of such a disease — yet 
the rest from legislative labors and worries was probably 
doing him good. " Possibly," he answered dubiously, and 
then turned to the subject of " The Great Conspiracy " and 
the pecuniary worries and disappointments connected with, 
the publication of that work. 

logan's graphic stories — Lincoln as a story-teller — 
logan's gallop along the lines at vicksburg — his un- 
recorded WOUND. 

During a pause in the conversation, his daughter, Mrs. 

Tucker, mentioned that Mr. Jacob Wheeler — an old soldier 
29 



45 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

who was with the General at Vicksburg — and Mr. Stevenson 
of St. Louis, were approaching the house, and asked if he 
would see them ? " Yes," said the General, " tell them to 
come up," and soon they were ushered in and seated. Of 
what followed on this last really good day that the General 
had, Mr. Stevenson has given so admirably graphic an ac- 
count in the Globe-Democrat, that the temptation to give it 
here is irresistible, especially as the writer of this work was 
present throughout, and can vouch for the verity of this report. 
Says Mr. Stevenson : 

Twenty-four years ago, at Huntsville, General Logan discovered 
that tramping around in the snow meant rheumatism. Since then he 
has learned that repetition of the exposure insures a return of the 
twinges. He sits now in an upper chamber at Calumet Place with his 
right arm twice its normal size and swathed in cotton. Occasional bad 
sensations in other joints than those most affected reveal the possibility 
of something worse than what he endures at present. Some of the time 
the pains are so severe they drive him to his bed, but when others would 
be down the General is up, in his easy-chair, with a screen between him 
and the draught. Around the open fireplace friends gather and help pass 
away the hours. The pains go shooting through the arm and the Gen- 
eral growls. Then there is a respite and he tells a story. The harder 
the twinge the better the story. One standing just outside the chamber 
door and hearing the peals of laughter, would never imagine there was 
any suffering going on within. 

Lincoln's jokes. 
Somebody told one of Lincoln's stories, and this started the General. 
"I had some doubts for a time about the authenticity of the stories 
attributed to Lincoln," he said, " until an experience of my own with 
him. I was sent from the West by Grant with some despatches which 
were to be delivered to the President in person. It was late Saturday 
night when I got into Washington. The next morning I went to the 
White House and there was nobody about. I made a noise at the door 
until someone came and said that Mr. Lincoln couldn't be seen on Sun- 
day ; it was against the rules. 'Go upstairs,' I said, 'and tell the Pres- 
ident that Logan is here with some important despatches from Grant.' 
Pretty soon the messenger came back and told me to walk up. When 
I got into the room Mr. Lincoln was sitting in a chair with one foot on 
a table and his head thrown back. A barber was just getting through 



LOGAN'S LAST DAYS AND DEATH. 



45* 



shaving him. He told me to take a seat and he would be ready to talk 
to me in a few minutes. The barber finished the shaving and went to 
work on the hair. Mr. Lincoln saw me glance at his foot. It was much 
swollen. Both of his feet, in fact, were in a bad condition. I said noth- 
ing, but he commenced talking about them. 'They remind me,' said 
he, 'of a man in Sangamon County who made a pretty bad horse trade. 
The animal was in awful condition, but the farmer got him home. About 
two weeks afterward one of his neighbors met him and asked him how 
his new horse was coming on. " Oh, first rate," said the farmer, " he's 
putting on flesh fast. He's fat now up to his knees." That's my fix.' 

"Since then," said General Logan, "I have accepted as authentic 
all Lincoln stories." 

A STORY OF PERSONAL EXPOSURE. 

" We used to think you exposed yourself when there wasn't need of 
it, sometimes," someone remarked, " especially at Vicksburg, when we 
saw you get out from cover and look through your glasses at the 
works." 

"That was a mistake," replied the general ; " I never did anything 
of that kind unless I felt there was occasion for it. Sometimes it is 
necessary for a commanding officer to go into danger to inspire the right 
kind of feeling among his men. Then there are acts which look fool- 
hardy, but which are nothing more than ordinary common-sense. I 
remember while we were in front of Vicksburg I was out on the line 
one day. The rebels commenced shooting at me, and as soon as I dis- 
covered what they were doing and had got the range, I galloped right 
along down the line. They must have fired a hundred shots before I 
got out of the way. One bullet slightly wounded the horse and another 
chipped the saddle. I suppose that looked to some people like courage. 
It wasn't. It was horse sense. If I had turned and ridden down the hill 
right away from the front they would probably have bored me through 
the back half a dozen times. By riding as I did I made it next to im- 
possible for them to hit me." 

" It is greatly a matter of chance in war," continued the General. 
"A little more or a little less exposure doesn't make much difference. 
There is this that is in favor of the officer. Marksmen on the other side 
are so anxious to hit him that they shoot too quick or get excited and 
aim badly. I was wounded at Vicksburg, but you fellows never knew 
it." 

The general stopped and glanced at the group of listeners with a 
twinkle in his eye. 

"We heard the chair you was sitting on was hit," said one. 



452 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



ANOTHER OF LOGAN S WOUNDS. 



" Yes," continued the General, " I laid it on the chair. I expect that 
saved me from a worse wound than I got. The way it happened was 
this. I was sitting, leaning back, with my right foot up against the 
ridge-pole of the tent. The bullet struck the leg of the chair just at the 
top and went in here (pointing to the under portion of the thigh). 
Tiie surgeon dug the ball out and fixed me up. I told him not to say 
anything about it, and he didn't. It was only a flesh wound. I didn't 
get into the saddle for some days, but all that was known about the 
matter was that the chair had been hit." 

LOGAN AND THE DOCTOR — ABOUT ACONITE — THE STORY ABOUT LOGAN AND 
THE CAPITOL-GUIDE — LOGAN'S POOR OPINION OF DOCTORS. 

The arrival of the medical attendant put a temporary check upon 
the war reminiscences. 

" Well, General, how did you sleep last night ? " the doctor asked, as 
he looked around at the smiling group. 

"Pretty well," replied the General ; "better than the night before." 

"Oh," said the doctor, " the pills helped you." 

" No," replied the General, perversely, " I think it was the stone." 

Then it came out that the General was pursuing three courses of treat- 
ment at one and the same time for his rheumatism. He had the advice 
and prescriptions of Dr. Baxter, one of the most eminent physicians in 
Washington. He was receiving the attention of a big brawny Her- 
cules, who believed he could rub rheumatism and everything else out 
through the soles of the feet or through the ends of the fingers, accord- 
ing to the location of the point affected. And finally the General was 
taking to bed with him every night a block of sandstone as big as a 
brick, with alleged curative powers. 

" All, yon think it was the stone, do you ? " retorted Dr. Baxter. " I 
think I'll have you continue the pills, however." 

"All right," said the General, "I'll take anything but aconite." 

"And why not aconite ?" asked Dr. Baxter. 

"Because I know what it is," said the General. "I'm something of 
a doctor myself, you know." 

"Ah, yes," said Dr. Baxter, with a chuckle ; "can you tell me what 
office the spleen performs?" 

"No," said the General, "and you can't tell me either. If you can 
I'll give you a diploma." 

" But why are you so set against aconite ? " 



LOGAN'S LAST DAYS AND DEATH. 453 

" Because I saw a man killed with it once," replied the General. "I, 
stood by his bed and saw him die within two minutes after he had taken 
the medicine. The doctors all said apoplexy killed him. The coroner 
and papers said it was apoplexy. I believe nothing but the aconite did 
it. I don't believe that doctors can judge the condition of the system 
with sufficient accuracy to enable them to give aconite with safety, and 
I will never take it." 

"Well," said the doctor, as he filled out a blank, "we won't give you 
aconite. But, General, I heard a rather good story on you last night. 
Senators Frye and Hale were telling it. They say that a new guide at 
the Capitol didn't know you, and wanted to show you through die 
building ! " 

"That was some time ago," said the General, with abroad smile. 
"A young man stepped up as I was going into the Capitol one day and 
said he'd like to take me through and point out the interesting tilings. 

" ' Is there much worth seeing in here ?' I asked him. 

" ' Oh, yes,' he said, ' if you know where to look. I'll take you 
through if you like.' 

" ' All right,' said I, and I was going with him when one of the old 
guides stepped up and pulled him by the coat and said, 'You derned 
fool, that old cuss has been around here more than thirty years.' " 

" Frye and Hale say he said ' that old Injun,' " put in the doctor. 

"Yes," said the General, " that is their improvement on the story." 

logan's opinion of doctors. 

As the doctor withdrew the General nodded in his direction and said 
to his circle of listeners : " I know these chaps. My father was a doc- 
tor, and he intended me to be one. When I was a youngster I had to 
mix the medicines in one of those big mortars with a pestle. People 
would come round, and father would feel their pulses and look at their 
tongues and tell me to mix up some pills — put in a lot of stuff that 
wouldn't hurt anybody. They'd take the medicine and go off and im- 
agine it cured them. They would have got well just as quick if they 
hadn't taken anything. The old gentleman used to put me to studying 
anatomy, and I knew all about the bones and muscles and organs, but I 
didn't take to it very kindly. I used to say to him : ' Father, why don't 
you make a man ? Here you've got all the material. You know how 
to put the bones together, and you know where the flesh and the mus- 
cles go and what all the parts are made of. Why can't you build a man 
and then turn in the blood and set the machine a-going?' He would 
look at me and say : 'John, I don't think you've got sense enough to 
make a doctor.' " 



454 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

"General," suggested a visitor, as a particularly bad twinge made 
the sufferer grit his teeth, "the Hot Springs would take that out of 
you." 

"Yes, I know it," was the reply. " I've tried boiling it out, and that 
is the best treatment. I may have to go down to the springs later, but 
I don't want to go now if I can help it. There are matters here that I 
am anxious to look after." 

ANECDOTES ABOUT HAZEN AND OTHERS — LOGAN'S IDEAS ABOUT 
MILITARY DISCIPLINE HOW MRS. LOGAN " CUT A MAN 

DOWN ! " 

* 

There were many other things said during the long and 
interesting conversation of General Logan with his friends on 
this occasion, some of which, like those just given, were taken 
down in short-hand by Mr. Stevenson, while others were not. 
For instance, the General re-told the story, given in "The 
Great Conspiracy," originally told by Lincoln to McClellan 
when they were together inspecting the breastworks thrown 
up at various points, during the war, around Washington City ; 
talked about Fremont and Pope ; and, someone having said 
something about the discipline, or lack of it, in our Union 
armies, General Logan talked about that. Said he : 

There were some officers in our armies who were very severe in their 
discipline of the volunteers. I never believed in it, and never found it 
necessary. I always got along well enough without it. I remember 
when we were at Memphis, in the winter of 1862-63, that word came to 
me that one of the men for some offence — I forget what — had been tied 
up, hands and feet to a tree. Mary happened to be with me at the time. 
I asked by whose order it had been done, and found that Major Stol- 
brand— a gallant officer, but imbued with those European notions of 
discipline which are not necessary in our armies — had ordered it. I 
could not myself go out at the time, but handed my knife to my wife 
and said : " Take that, Mary, and cut the man down. No one will trouble 
you." And she went out with that knife— yes, she did ! — and cut the 
fastenings, and liberated the man ! And Stolbrand kicked around, and 
swore some, but neither he, nor anyone else in my command ever did 
anything of that sort again. There never was any need of it. Now 
there's Ilazen. Well, everybody seems to think he's a hard man to get 
along with. I never had any trouble with him. When he was assigned 



LOGAN'S LAST DAYS AND DEATH. 455 

to me, he was the senior general of division in my corps. It was in the 
Atlanta campaign. His division happened to be assigned that morning 
to bring up the rear, in one of our advances. He sent a member of his 
staff to me, complaining of this, as by his seniority he thought his di- 
vision should lead the advance. I turned to his staff-officer and said : 
"Give my compliments to General Hazen, and tell him that when I 
want his advice in the disposition of my troops I will ask it." I never 
had any more trouble with Hazen, who was a good soldier. 

LOGAN TALKS ABOUT DOUGLAS AND THE WAR ABOUT GENE- 
RAL SHERMAN. 

Logan also on this occasion, as narrated in " Logan's Last 
Interview," said some interesting things about Douglas and 
General Sherman, which came out, as reported, thus : 

Some chance question brought up recollections of Stephen A. 
Douglas, and there is nobody living now who can speak of the Little 
Giant from such an intimate acquaintance as Senator Logan enjoyed. 

The question was : " If Douglas had lived he would have been in 
Lincoln's Cabinet, wouldn't he, General ? " 

" No," said General Logan, " I don't think he would. I believe he 
would have taken the field, and if he had he would have been the great- 
est general of the war. There was no question about where Douglas 
stood when the war was coming on. He differed from most of the men 
in the North in his estimate of what a war it was going to be. He had 
been through the South in his campaign ; he knew the extent of the 
preparation, and he measured the feeling down there better than we did. 
I talked with him in Washington, was with him in Springfield when he 
made that great speech, and rode in the same seat with him goingupto 
Chicago just before he died. I say I think he would have taken the 
field, for in his conversation with me his mind was on the war that must 
be fought through, and he outlined the two great campaigns that must 
be carried out, just as we afterward adopted them — the movement in the 
West against Vicksburg, and so on, and the movement in the East, with 
Richmond as the objective point." 

"Did Douglas expect to be elected President?" 

"No, I don't think he did," the General answered. " I was in the 
convention that nominated him, and I have always thought Douglas 
looked forward to defeat. In that joint debate which Lincoln and 
Douglas made for the Illinois Senatorship, Douglas won, but at the- 
same time destroyed his chances for the Presidency." 



456 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

" Lincoln said after the debate was over that Douglas would be 
Senator, but he could never be President," suggested an Illinois man. 

" He spoke the truth," said General Logan. " In that debate Lin- 
coln forced the issue of slavery, and obliged Douglas to commit himself 
to such a position on the question of slave ownership in the Territories 
that a split in the Democratic Party was inevitable. The slave States 
couldn't accept Douglas after that, and in my opinion Douglas went 
through the campaign without expecting success." 

"They rotten-egged him in the South, didn't they?" 

"Yes, and that trip gave him the opportunity to form a correct 
estimate of what was coming." 

"Douglas and General Sherman, " continued General Logan, "were 
about the only two men on our side who appreciated the magnitude of 
the war in anticipation. I know I didn't. I knew that there were only 
about 230,000 slaveholders, and I argued that the fighting on the part of 
the South would be limited to that element. It didn't seem in reason 
then, that other hundreds of thousands would take up the cause of these 
slaveholders who thought their property was in danger, and would help 
them fight their battles." 

"We called Sherman crazy because he said the North might as well 
try to put out a big fire with a squirt-gun as to put down the rebellion 
with 75,000 men," someone suggested. 

" Yes, " said General Logan, " they called Sherman crazy ; but he had 
been South. He had charge of a military school in Louisiana before 
the war commenced, and knew what they were doing down there. I 
have talked with him recently about those times. He saw that they 
were making preparations for a great war. Some of them used to come 
to him wearing their uniforms. I don't know that they ever approached 
him with a point-blank proposition to go in with them, but they tried 
once to get him to recognize the Confederate States of America in a re- 
ceipt for some arms. He refused. If he had done it the North wouldn't 
have had much use for him afterward. He left the Southerners wearing 
uniforms, and drilling, and came North. Men in Ohio were ploughing in 
their fields. He told them there was going to be a great war, and that 
Ohio might be invaded ; that they ought to be getting ready. They 
laughed at him. He came on to Washington, and told his hrother John 
and others. Nobody would believe there was any such struggle ahead 
as he predicted. He could hardly get people here to listen to his warn- 
ings." 



LOGAN'S LAST DAYS AND DEATH. 



457 



GETTING WORSE BAD NIGHTS READING LOGAN TO SLEEP 

HIS OPINION OF THE LEE MEMOIRS. 

After the other visitors had retired, the writer continued 
talking with the General for awhile, and then left him impressed 
with the belief that a few days more would effect a complete 
restoration to health. On the following Monday, December 
20th, having learned from the General's secretaries that he 
was now, and had been for several days, confined to his bed, 
and that one of them, Albert B. Hall, had been reading to 
him a good deal during that time to help divert his mind 
from the dreadful pain he suffered, the writer again visited 
Calumet Place. The sufferer was in bed, Mrs. Logan 
being in constant attendance. The General lay with his 
legs drawn up, and so rigid that it was with difficulty, and 
the utmost care, that their position could be changed even so 
much as an inch at a time. Even such slight changes of posi- 
tion gave him great agony. He had experienced a bad night, 
and in the hope of getting him to sleep, the writer offered to 
read to him from the life of General Lee, from which others 
had been reading for his benefit. During the reading, the 
General occasionally dozed, and then, awaking, would make 
some comment, — such as : " According to that book Lee was 
a demi-god, and nobody else amounted to much," or: "It 
would seem by that that the South did all the victorious fight- 
ing and the North was nowhere," or: "That is not true, the 
book is made up of exaggerations, or worse," — and after 
quietly listening to more of it, would again seem to drop to 
sleep. The reading was interrupted by a visit of the Rev. 
Dr. Newman, and after he had retired, and young Logan 
arrived and bodily lifted his father into a more comfortable 
position, the writer also took his leave. Again, on the fol- 
lowing Thursday, the writer went to Calumet Place, but, 
learning that the General was resting better and was then 
asleep, left the house without seeing him. Later in the day, 



45 8 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

being at young Logan's office, Mrs. Tucker came in on her 
way to get Dr. Baxter — as the General felt worse, the 
pain now troubling him in the chest. 

CHRISTMAS-EVE INCIDENT LOGAN'S LAST WISH MORE PHYSI- 
CIANS CALLED IN LOGAN SINKING INTO COMA HIS LAST 

RECOGNITIONS AND LAST WORD. 

On Friday, December 24th, about 5 p.m., the writer 
was again at the sufferer's bedside. The General seemed 
to be much easier, the limbs had lost their rigidity and 
the muscles were now relaxed. There was now no trouble 
with the chest. The pain had shifted from the right arm 
to the left, which he was now unable to use. At this time 
the General was thoroughly conscious and clear-headed 
when spoken to. He spoke but little and that with some- 
thing like a drowsy effort as if he needed more sleep. On 
retiring the writer shook hands with him, and remarked, with 
some earnestness : " General, it would be a mockery to wish 
you a merry Christmas, but I do wish you a quiet and peace- 
ful one." " No," said the General, slowly and distinctly, "not 
a merry Christmas, but I hope a quiet and peaceful one."* 
Promising to be with him again in a few days, and receiving 
a warm, lingering, double-pressure from Logan's hand, the 
writer left the room, never doubting but that in those few 
coming days the General would at least be sitting up again. 

The next day (Saturday) was Christmas Day. On Sun- 
day, upon leaving church in the afternoon, the writer was in- 
formed that the morning papers reported that the General's 
illness had taken a serious turn. Hurrying - home, and while 
taking a hasty bite, the writer glanced at the Sunday Herald, 
and, under the startling head-line " Senator Logan in Dan- 
ger," read the following alarming statement : 

The condition of Senator Logan, who has been suffering for some 
days past from an attack of acute rheumatism, has grown rapidly worse, 

* Sec also Logan's last Christmas Souvenir, in Part VII., Addenda. 



LOGAN'S LAST DAYS AND DEATH. 459 

so much so as seriously to alarm his family. Friends in attendance 
speak in despondent terms of the prospect of his recovery. Dr. J. H. 
Baxter, the attending physician, said to an Associated Press reporter 
last night that the General's condition was indeed alarming. " His ill- 
ness," said the Doctor, " dates back to nearly two weeks ago, when I 
was called and found him suffering considerably from acute rheu- 
matism, which was then confined chiefly to his right wrist. In three 
or four days it yielded to treatment and he became very much better, 
but within a day or two he took additional cold, which resulted in re- 
lapse, the rheumatic affection extending to his hips and lower extremi- 
ties as well as to both arms. The attack has been attended at times by 
high fever and nervous prostration, in which the brain is considerably 
involved, resulting in delirium more or less active. While he is not 
now suffering any pain incident to the rheumatism, yet there has been, 
for the past two or three days, a gradual decrease in strength and a ten- 
dency to brain complications of a very serious nature. The fact is," said 
the Doctor, " that he was much reduced in strength by overwork and 
his system was not in a proper condition to resist disease. He lies most 
of the time in a semi-conscious condition, from which he is with diffi- 
culty aroused. At times he knows his friends, but soon again sinks into 
a lethargic sleep. His fever is somewhat increased to-night, and the 
brain symptoms are more prominent and his condition, I must say, is 
very critical." In response to a question, the Doctor said that the dan- 
ger lies not so much in the possibility of heart complications as in ex- 
treme exhaustion and brain affections. The Doctor said that the Sen- 
ator had an attack four years ago somewhat similar to the present, but 
it was not attended by many of the alarming symptoms prominent now. 
Dr. Baxter has called Dr. Hamilton, Surgeon-General of the Marine 
Hospital Service, and Dr. Lincoln as consulting physicians. Consulta- 
tions are held three or four times daily. One of the physicians re- 
mained at the Senator's bedside last night, to be relieved by another, 
who will remain during the entire day. 

A reporter who called at Calumet Place at midnight was told that 
the Senator was thought to be slightly better, seeming to have im- 
proved a little in strength and to be less inclined to stupor than earlier 
in the evening. Dr. Hamilton and Representative George G. Symes, 
of Colorado, will remain at the Senator's bedside during the night. 

It was afterward learned by the writer that this state of 
coma into which the General had passed, was broken only by 
a few looks and hand-pressures of recognition when his family 



460 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

sought to arouse him from the stupor, and during the morn- 
ing by a few inarticulate words which clearly closed with the 
name of his wife, " Mary." 

THE PASSING AWAY AFFECTING SCENES IN THE CHAMBER OF 

DEATH. 

The writer's residence being very distant from Calumet 
Place, it was approaching 3 p.m. when he found himself on 
Clifton Street where it enters Fourteenth. As he neared 
Thirteenth, a carriage rolled by, and Beach Taylor, one of 
the General's secretaries, leaned out and said, in answer to 
the writer's inquiry: "The General is dying — now!" In a 
few moments more, the writer had entered Calumet Place, 
and, merely noting, as he passed, the parlors and broad hall 
crowded with grave and anxious faces, and the general aspect 
of hushed suspense, ascended the great stairway, into the 
General's chamber, and reaching the foot of the bed, stood 
looking upon the last of Logan upon earth, the weeping wife 
and children and friends about him. Half-reclining at the 
dying warrior's left, the afflicted wife, the devoted sharer, for 
more than thirty years, of his ambitions, his triumphs and dis- 
appointments, his joys and sorrows, was fondly caressing his 
face, slightly turned toward her, and alternately wailing out 
her love for the dying, and self-reproaches — albeit undeserved 
— for having ever left him even for a moment. Raising her 
head and catching sight of the writer she cried : "Oh, Mr. 
Dawson, when you left us Friday evening you surely never 
thought it would come to this ! " It was a heart-rending 
scene. There, near his mother, young Logan, leaned over 
the bed, at one moment striving to comfort her, and at the 
next anxiously watching the slight respirations of the dying 
f;iiher. Behind him was Mrs. Cullom, and near the foot of 
the bed stood the Rev. Dr. Newman with clasped hands. On 
the right of the bed, leaning over it, and with face sometimes 
half-buried in the pillows, was the General's daughter, Mrs. 



LOGAN'S LAST DAYS AND DEATH. 461 

Tucker, Major Tucker and Mrs. Thomas alternately attempt- 
ing- to reconcile her to the falling blow, while grouped on 
the same side, somewhat back from the bed, stood Beach Tay- 
lor, Senator Cullom, Daniel Shepard, and Representatives 
Thomas, Henderson, and Symes. Midway, stooping low, 
half-kneeling, his watch in one hand and feeling the flutter- 
ing pulse with the other, was Dr. Baxter, while Miss Mary 
Brady knelt, sobbing, near the foot. At the end of the couch 
stood Senator Cockrell, General Sheridan, General Beale 
and the writer, while behind them were Senator Miller of 
New York, Judge Henry Strong, Albert B. Hall, Dr. Powell, 
and General Raum. These were the sad witnesses of Logan's 
earthly end. Gradually as they looked on, the death-hue 
deepened upon the upturned face, the breast of the warrior 
gently heaved once or twice, and then, at a gesture from the 
physician, Dr. Newman raised his arms and his voice in 
solemn supplication to the Divine Throne that the soul of the 
dying might be received in the Holy Kingdom, that his use- 
ful life and grand example might still be of benefit to the 
Nation, and that the dear ones he had left behind might be 
upheld in their affliction and comforted by the Divine Com- 
forter. 

Thus, at 2.55 p.m., surrounded by his weeping family and 
friends, and by the incense of ascending prayer, Logan 
calmly resigned his heroic soul to God. 

CALUMET PLACE IN MOURNING THE GUARD-MOUNT THE 

QUESTION OF FINAL RESTING-PLACE. 

The heart-rending scenes at Calumet Place which fol- 
lowed the sudden demise of General Logan will never be for- 
gotten by those whose sad privilege it was to witness them. 
All the Senators and Representatives whom the Christmas 
recess had not called away from Washington, at once called, 
as did thousands of others of all degrees in life, to offer their 
sympathizing condolences and proffer such assistance as they 



462 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



might to the sorely stricken family. Calumet Place was in 
mourning, and its spacious rooms and halls were constantly 
thronged during every day, for days, with these sympathetic 
friends and relatives, whose grave faces, hushed voices, and 
noiseless steps, betrayed at once their tender consideration 
for the living and their loving respect for the dead. By tele- 
graphic wire, and by mail also, came daily and hourly, from 
all parts of the country, and in some instances from Europe 
as well, messages of sorrow and condolence to the bereaved 
family, which plainly showed how close the illustrious dead 
was to the hearts of the people. 

The United States Senate, through its Sergeant-at-Arms, 
took charge of the funeral arrangements, and a committee of 
United States Senators was at once formed for the purpose. 
To the Grand Army of the Republic was committed, in the 
main, the honor of guarding the remains of that dead hero 
who had been their beloved comrade and commander-in- 
chief; and night and day, detachments from the Grand Army 
Posts by turns mounted guard, keeping watch and ward 
over the remains to them so sacred and so dear. 

Meanwhile, the question of selecting a place of final sepul- 
ture for the dead warrior-statesman became a serious one. 
Various parts of the country solicited the honor, but naturally 
the afflicted widow could consider only two of them : Chicago 
and Washington — and there were legal difficulties in both 
cases which must be cleared away before any conclusion 
could properly be reached. The Illinois delegation was 
unanimous in asking that the State of Logan's birth should 
hold his honored ashes, while others thought that inas- 
much as his name, his deeds, and fame, were not local, but 
national, they should receive sepulture — as they believed he 
would himself have preferred — in the beautiful grounds of 
the Soldiers' Home at the National Capital. In view, how- 
ever, of the legal difficulties, it was very properly decided by 
the General's widow, that the body should be temporarily de- 



LOGAN'S LAST DAYS AND DEATH. 463 

posited in a vaulted tomb in Rock Creek Church-yard, near 
the city of Washington. 

THE UNITED STATES SENATE COMMITTEE OF ARRANGEMENTS 
AND THE PALL-BEARERS — TAKING THE REMAINS TO THE 
NATIONAL CAPITOL — LOGAN LYING IN STATE UNDER THE 
GREAT WHITE DOME. 

It was decided, therefore, by the Committee of Arrange- 
ments, with the widow's consent, that the remains of the 
dead soldier-Senator be taken to the rotunda of the Na- 
tional Capitol, there to lie in state, under guard, from noon 
of the following Thursday to noon of Friday, — in order to 
give the people the opportunity they craved of seeing them, — 
thence to be taken to the Senate Chamber where funeral ser- 
vices would be held, and thence to the cemetery of Rock Creek 
Church for temporary deposit.* 

The Senate Committee of Arrangements comprised Sen- 
ators Cullom, of Illinois ; Stanford, of California ; Cockrell, 
of Missouri; Allison, of Iowa; Beck, of Kentucky; Haw- 
ley, of Connecticut; Voorhees, of Indiana; Hampton, of 
South Carolina, and Manderson, of Nebraska. The pall- 
bearers selected were the Hon. Messrs. Simon Cameron, 
Roscoe Conkling, and Robert Lincoln ; Generals W. T. 
Sherman, W. F. Vilas, John C. Black, Lucius Fairchild, 
and M. L. Leggett ; Governor Jeremiah Rusk, Mr. C. H. 
Andrews, and Dr. Charles McMillan. 

As when Logan died the sky was overcast with gloomy 
clouds and falling snow, so when Thursday came there was a 
fresh snow-fall and sombre-clouded skies. Shortly before 
twelve o'clock the beautiful casket — with its plate-glass top re- 
vealing the entire form of the dead General, dressed in black, 
his right hand half concealed by the buttoned front and resting 
upon his breast, as it was so often seen in life, and with his 
Grand Army and other medals upon his left breast, — was 

* Hereafter they will be placed beneath a fitting monument to be erected in Chicago by 
the Lake Shore. 



464 LIFE OF IOGAN. 

draped with the flag of his country, in whose defence he had 
so often and valiantly fought and shed his blood, and borne out 
of the death-chamber, down the grand staircase, through the 
broad hall to the waiting hearse, between long ranks of Sena- 
tors, Representatives, and other mourning friends, to the sad 
music of shrill fifes and muffled drums. Escorted by a mil- 
itary guard of honor, and followed by a long line of equipages, 
the remains were thus taken to the National Capitol, and 
placed in the centre of the rotunda, upon a catafalque, whose 
sombre black was relieved by the colors of the national en- 
sign, the many exquisite floral emblems which surrounded 
it, and the various representative military uniforms worn by 
the large guard of honor. 

As the body of the dead General lay there in the rotunda, 
— whose doorways and pillars wore the emblems of mourn- 
ing in festoons and pendants, — holding, beneath the great 
white dome, his " last review," the tens of thousands of 
people of all ages, sexes, and colors, who thronged to the 
Capitol to gaze upon the hero's face for the last time, attested 
his remarkable local popularity ; and, as the double line of 
procession slowly moved by, on either side of the casket, from 
east to west, and beheld that bronzed face, so calm and nat- 
ural-looking, it seemed harder than ever to believe that 
Logan was really dead. Now, and again, as the great sad 
procession passed along, some limping soldier or aged vet- 
eran would linger with moistened eyes until forced to move 
on. " All the afternoon," said one of the journalistic re- 
ports, " and up to midnight there was not a break in the 
line of the people. The wind blew keenly and a dismal sleet 
was falling, but these did not prevent the people from 
thronging by thousands to view the illustrious remains." At 
an early hour in the morning the orderly rush was renewed, 
and continued until eleven o'clock, when it became necessary 
to close the doors in order to carry out further arrangements 
for the obsequies. 





UNDER THE GREAT WHITE DOME.— Page 464. 



LOGAN'S LAST DAYS AND DEATH. 465 

LETTERS OF CONDOLENCE FROM NOTABLE PERSONS EVERYWHERE. 

Meanwhile, from the hour when the telegraph wires star- 
tled the whole country on that sad Sunday afternoon when 
General Logan breathed his last, until now, a constant stream 
of telegrams and letters of condolence poured in upon the 
bereaved ones at Calumet Place. In a work like this it is 
impossible, — as they would fill a volume of themselves, — to 
give more than a hint of their contents. Only a very few 
therefore in whole, or in part, can be given as representing 
the deep and widespread emotion occasioned throughout the 
land, from highest to lowest, by the death of Logan. From 
Mrs. Grover Cleveland came the words : " We wish you to 
know that our hearts are filled with the deepest sympathy for 
you. My husband, who is ill in bed, joins me most earnestly 
in my message of condolence, and begs me to say that added 
to his sympathy for you in your affliction, is his own grief at 
the loss of an honored and esteemed friend." From Mrs. 
James A. Garfield: "How shocked and saddened I am to 
read of your great sorrow and of the Nation's loss." From 
John Hay : " Our country has lost a great and good soldier 
and statesman in the fulness of his splendid powers." From 
Samuel J. Randall: "The country's loss is great and yours 
irreparable." From William M. Evarts : " It is hard to 
realize that he has been torn from the fulness of life, and 
health, and thought, before we could even think of him as a 
mark for disease and death." From William Vilas : " My 
wife and I pray to be admitted to join in the expression of 
tenderness and honor with which this Nation and all its people 
hold the patriot and soldier and statesman who has entered 
into rest after the mighty toils and hard-won glories of his 
heroic life." From S. S. Cox: " Nothing has occurred since 
the death of Douglas which has shocked me so inexpressibly 
as the death of your dear husband." From Mrs. Katherine 
Chase: "The thoughts of none follow you with more pro- 

3° 



466 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



found or more respectful sympathy than mine." From Gen- 
eral Nelson A. Miles: "General Logan's death will be a 
great loss to the army, of which he had been a benefactor and 
friend." From John D. Long : " No other of our public men 
could have left us, and in so doing touched a deeper chord 
of affectionate and generous remembrance." From Mrs. 
Frederick Grant: "What a shock dear General Logan's 
death was to us all here. . . . Mrs. Grant sends her 
warmest regards, and sympathy which is so real. Colonel 
Grant is really miserable." From Charles Devens : "No 
more upright, true, and brave man lived. To the country 
the loss is great; to you, and his children, it is irreparable." 
From John A. Bingham: " In common with all his countrymen 
I deeply lament the Nation's loss. His mortal body has died, 
but the man has not died. The clean, pure, lofty spirit of 
John A. Logan still lives, and will live for evermore." From 
Madame de Barrios : " I can so readily feel all you must 
suffer, for we are alike afflicted, and can shed tears of desola- 
tion together." From Clara Barton : " The stroke . . . 
has tipped anew with love the point of steel that engraves 
' Logan ' on every loyal heart." From General Daniel 
Sickles : " The country has lost a true friend, brave soldier, 
and staunch patriot." From General F. E. Spinner : "The 
soldier-statesman is dead, and many millions mourn his loss 
with you, but his heroic soul, the glory of the soldier, and the 
lustre of the statesman, lives, and will live, through all time in 
the grateful memory of mankind." From Justin S. Morrill : 
"Among the American people, no name of the present 
generation has won a more solid fame or will command a 
larger number of personal mourners." From General James 
A. Beaver : " Black as the cloud is, its golden rim may be 
found in the useful and serviceable life of your great, great- 
hearted husband." From the Mexican, Chinese, Japanese, 
and other Foreign Ministers at Washington ; from Senators 
and Representatives at their homes ; from other distinguished 



LOGAN'S LAST DAYS AND DEATH. 467 

men, whether in or out of the councils and administration of 
the Nation, or from their wives or daughters, as well as from 
Grand Army Posts, came trooping in by wire and by post, 
from all over the land, messages, such as these, laden with 
sympathy for the stricken widow and appreciation of the illus- 
trious dead ; but, perhaps nothing better exhibited the univer- 
sality of this feeling than an official despatch to Mrs. Logan, 
from Robert E. Lee Camp No. 1, Confederate Veterans, Rich- 
mond, Virginia, which said : " In this sad hour, you have the 
hearty sympathy of those who, in the years ago, battled with 
their might against the gallant soldier, now no more, whose 
memory will live with us, because of the kindly heart and 
open hand which prompted generous aid for our helpless 
comrades in their need." 

THE WONDERFUL PROFUSION OF FLORAL OFFERINGS A FLORAL 

MOUND. 

But to return to the obsequies. By eleven o'clock a.m. 
the galleries of the United States Senate Chamber were 
rapidly filling with people. The Chamber itself was draped 
with black, and the dead Senator's chair, the second from the 
central aisle in the front row, was entirely covered with crape. 
The long white-marble " desk " of the secretary and his clerks 
was hidden by the numberless floral emblems of varied designs 
which had been sent by military, masonic, and other associa- 
tions, as well as individuals, from different parts of the coun- 
try. It was a veritable mound of flowers. Conspicuously 
standing on either end of it was an immense floral represen- 
tation of the banner (with badge) of the Fifteenth Army 
Corps, — which Logan had so often led to victory, — and a 
huge floral anchor. Crosses, and stars, and wreaths, and 
broken columns, and pillows, and crossed cannon, and crossed 
swords, and other beautiful and suggestive designs, with ap- 
propriate inscriptions, in white and red and yellow roses, and 
violets, and immortelles, with laurel leaves, and sturdy ivy, 



4 68 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

and trailing smilax, and palm branches, affording relief in 
various shades of green, composed this remarkable floral 
mound whose garnered fragrance fitly perfumed the spacious 
chamber in honor of the great soldier who had himself insti- 
tuted Memorial Day and the touchingly beautiful custom of 
scattering floral offerings upon the sacred graves of the Na- 
tion's dead. 

the logan obsequies in the senate chamber the rev. 

dr. newman's eloquent funeral panegyric on logan. 

By twelve o'clock m. of Thursday, December 31, 1886, 
the galleries of the Senate Chamber were closely packed 
with people admitted by card, and the floor of the Chamber, 
upon which hundreds of additional chairs had been placed, 
was also crowded with Senators, Representatives, the Cabi- 
net, the Diplomatic Corps, the Supreme Court, and other 
dignitaries of the land — the only seats vacant being that of 
the President of the United States, who through illness was 
unable to attend, and the seats reserved for the bereaved 
family, the honorary and active pall-bearers, the Grand Army 
veterans, and the Congressional Committee of Arrangements. 
Precisely at twelve o'clock the President of the Senate took 
his chair, and, as the great assemblage rose, the casket, pre- 
ceded by the officiating ministers, was borne into the Senate 
Chamber, down the central aisle and placed upon a bier in 
front of the floral mound, while the reserved seats were al- 
most simultaneously occupied. The solemn hush that befell 
the gathered notables of the land as the sad procession 
entered the Chamber and all had reached their allotted places, 
was now broken by the voice of Bishop Andrews lifted up in 
earnest prayer. As he closed, the Rev. Dr. Tiffany followed 
with the first parts of the Office for the Burial of the Dead 
used by the Episcopal Church, and Senate-Chaplain Butler 
read the Lesson therefrom. The Rev. Dr. John P. Newman 
then delivered the following 



LOGAN'S LAST DAYS AND DEATH. 469 

FUNERAL PANEGYRIC : 

Again is this chamber the shrine of a nation's dead. Around us are 
again the emblems of national grief. Once more is heard here the 
measured step of those who mourn the departure of the illustrious sol- 
dier, the faithful public servant, the honored private citizen, the abiding 
friend, the devoted husband, the loving father. Only those are thus 
honored at this shrine of the Republic, whose talents, whose virtues, 
whose services, have secured for them the distinguished position of 
Senator of the United States. 

Death is no stranger to this place of supreme legislation. Six times 
since 1859, when this chamber was first occupied, has death thrown its 
shadow here. Here rested in peace Senator Hicks, of Maryland ; here 
lay the form of Foot, of Vermont, once the presiding officer of the 
Senate ; here was laid the majestic form of Sumner, learned, eloquent, 
philanthropic ; hence was borne by friendly hands Wilson, who came 
forth from obscurity to occupy the second place in the government of 
a free people ; and but as yesterday we stood here around the bier of 
Miller, patriot and soldier, who sleeps in peace in the State he loved so 
well. 

And where else than here, in this place of honor, the arena of his 
greatest civic services and triumphs, where he displayed his eminent 
talents in statesmanship, where he was respected by all for the purity 
of his intentions, the ardor of his patriotism, the courage of his convic- 
tions, the power of his logic and his unselfish devotion to the public 
good — where else than here should Logan be honored with the rites of 
burial ? 

His was an honorable parentage. His father's genius and his 
mother's beauty blended in sweet harmony to bless his childhood. 
Irish brilliancy and Scotch solidity combined in his temperament, while 
he stood forth the true American, and the typical man of the West, of 
whom his nation is justly proud. From them he inherited his splendid 
physique, his capacious intellect, his loyal, loving, generous heart. In 
that Christian home his young intellect was developed and his young 
heart was taught that divine religion from which he never wavered ; 
and when the homestead was broken up, all he claimed and all he took 
was the old family Bible. 

That Logan was a potent factor in our national life, there can be no 
question. That his death has left a vacancy not easily filled, is without 
dispute. That his departure has changed the political direction of his 
country for the next decade, perhaps for the next quarter of a century, 
seems probable. 



47o 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



Standing here in the presence of the Almighty, and in the shadow of 
a great sorrow, let us leave eulogy to the fellow-Senators of the honored 
dead, and content ourselves with adducing those great lessons from 
Logan's life and character which should make us truer citizens and 
purer Christians. 

Macaulay has said that "Men eminent in learning, in statesmanship, 
in war, are not fully appreciated by their contemporaries ; but posterity 
does not fail to award them full justice." A greater than Macaulay has 
said : "A prophet is not without honor save in his own country." It is 
difficult for those who have not had the special advantages of the schools 
in early life to gain a reputation for mental culture and intellectual at- 
tainments ; but it is sufficient to say that whatever position Logan occu- 
pied, he was always in the front. If a strong reason, a sound judgment, 
a capacious and retentive memory, a vigorous and warm imagination and 
a comprehensive understanding are essential to high intellectuality, then 
Logan ranks among our foremost men. Others are great in scientific 
attainments, in the polish of literature, in the acquisition of languages ; 
but who excelled him in the useful information of science, and litera- 
ture, and law ; in knowledge of his country, its history, its resources, its 
wants, its possibilities, its hopes ? 

Let his vast and well-chosen library, rich in all learning, proclaim 
his love for books. Like Webster, he had the rare faculty to extract by 
instinct the pith of a volume that came to his hand. Intellectually, 
his rivals underestimated him, his friends never fully appreciated him, 
his admirers never overvalued him. He was a prodigious brain- 
worker, indefatigable in application, tireless in energy. He called upon 
all sources of knowledge to aid him in his purpose. His was a life of 
intellectual activity. From his admission to the bar, at the age of 
twenty-five, to his place in his State Legislature, to his place in Con- 
gress, and to his position as Senator, he has left the impress of his in- 
tellect upon the legislation of this country, which enters into its history 
for the last twenty-five years. What great measure of Congress is 
without his honored name ? Future generations will read his utterances 
with wonder and admiration. His great speeches on the "Impeach- 
ment," on "Education," on "The Army," his eulogy on "Thomas," his 
defence of " Grant," his arraignment of "Porter," will be esteemed 
masterful among forensic efforts. In all his legislative life he was never 
crushed in debate. 

Some men have the flower of language ; Logan had the flower of 
thought. He had the eloquence of logic, and could raise metaphor 
into argument. He resembled not so much the beautiful river whose 
broad stream winds through rich and varied scenery, but that which 



LOGAN'S LAST DAYS AND DEATH. 



471 



cuts a deep and rapid channel through rugged rocks and frowning 
wilds, leaving the impress of its power in the productiveness of the re- 
gion through which it passes, which, but for it, would remain desolate 
and barren. His was not the music of the organ, with its varied stops 
and mingling harmonies, but rather the sound of the trumpet, waxing 
louder and louder, piercing the caverns of the earth and resounding 
through the encircling heavens. 

It is a venerable saying of Scripture that the " day of a man's death 
is better than the day of his birth." When in the stillness of the holy 
Sabbath his noble soul left our presence, Logan was the foremost 
statesman of the mighty West. And hereafter and forever Illinois will 
have her illustrious trinity of national greatness — Lincoln, greatest of 
statesmen ; Grant, greatest of professional soldiers ; Logan, the greatest 
volunteer general produced by this country. 

But wherein consists that strange charm of his personality, that falls 
upon our spirits to-day like a holy enchantment ? Whence the magic 
spell of his presence ? Whence the secret of the power of that one life 
upon fifty millions of people? Is it sufficient to say that his parentage 
was honorable, that his intellect was rich in its acquired treasures, that 
he was the foremost statesman of the West ? Is it sufficient to say that 
he was a great soldier who proved himself equal to every command, 
that he was never defeated, that he defeated defeat and achieved vic- 
tory when all seemed lost, that from Belmont to Atlanta, and from 
Savannah to Washington, when, at the head of the victorious Army of 
the Tennessee, he marched through the avenues of the capital of a re- 
deemed country, he gave evidence of his martial prowess ? 

We must look deeper, and search with keener insight, for the secret 
of his immense power over his countrymen. His was a changeless sin- 
cerity. He was never in masquerade. He was transparent to a fault. 
He had a window in his heart. He was never in disguise. He was as 
you saw him. Never did geometrician bring proposition and demon- 
stration in closer proximity than was the correspondence between 
Logan's character and his appearance. He was Logan every time. 
His was the soul of honor. He had an innate contempt for everything 
low, mean, intriguing. He was an open and an honorable foe. He had 
a triple courage, which imparted to him immense strength. His phy- 
sical bravery knew no fear. His moral heroism was sublime. But 
above these was the courage of his intellect. Some men have brave 
souls in cowardly bodies. The cheeks of others are never blanched by 
physical danger. But few rise to the highest form of courage. Logan 
never committed treason against his intellect. He thought for himself, 
and spoke what he thought. He was loyal to his own conclusions. 



472 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

Friendship could not deter him ; enemies could not make him afraid. 
A great name could not daunt him. He had more caution than was ac- 
corded to him, but it was the caution of intellectual courage. 

He was the soul of honesty. He lived in times of great corruption, 
when the strongest men of both parties fell, either blasted by public ex- 
posure or by ignorant denunciation. But Logan was untouched. He 
was above suspicion. The smell of fire was not on his garments. Others 
made fortunes out of the blood of their countrymen, but after five years 
in war and twenty-five years in Congressional life, Logan was poor in 
purse, but rich in a good name. To his only son, who bears the image 
and name of his honored father, he could have left ill-gotten fortune, 
but he left him that which is far above rubies. Like Aristides, Logan 
could say, "These hands are clean." 

He had a self-abnegation which asked no other reward than the 
consciousness of duty done. Loyalty to duty was his standard of man- 
hood. When another was appointed to the command which his merits 
and victories entitled him to, he did not sulk in his tent of disappoint- 
ment, but fought on for the cause which was dearer than promotion. 
When duty demanded the exposure of corruption in his own party, he 
preferred his country to partisan ties. When he was convinced that a 
distinguished officer was unworthy a nation's confidence, he did not 
hesitate to incur the displeasure of friends and the denunciation of 
enemies. 

When, in 1862, his friends in Illinois urged him to leave the army 
and re-enter Congress, he made this reply : " No ; I am to-day a soldier 
of this Republic — so to remain, changeless and immutable, until her last 
and weakest enemy shall have expired and passed away. I have entered 
the field to die, if need be, for this Government, and never expect to re- 
turn to peaceful pursuits until the object of this war of preservation has 
become a fact established. Should fate so ordain it, I will esteem it as 
the highest privilege a just Dispenser can award to shed the last drop 
of blood in my veins for the honor of that flag whose emblems are jus- 
tice, liberty, and truth, and which has been and, as I humbly trust in God, 
ever will be for the right." 

Oh ! Brave and unselfish soul ! How thou hast been misunderstood, 
misjudged, misrepresented, defamed, and wronged by those who today 
arc the beneficiaries of thy noble life ! These defamations wounded his 
proud and sensitive spirit. If he seemed to take affront when assailed 
in debate, it was for the cause he represented, and not from personal 
pride. 

There were times when his ardent temperament mastered his self- 
control. He was a sensitive, high-spirited, chivalric soul. He had 



LOGAN'S LAST DAYS AND DEATH. 473 

pride of character and power of passion. He knew his power, but he 
was a stranger to vanity. His passionate nature was intense. His 
emotional being resembled the ocean. The passions of love, joy, hope, 
desire, grief, hatred, and anger, were strong in him. He could love 
like a woman, sport like a child, hope like a saint. His grief was in- 
tense, his hatred inveterate. His anger burned like a mountain on fire. 
He reminds us of the great Reformer, Luther, who alternated between 
profound calms and furious storms. His calms were like embowered 
lakes, their placid bosoms mirroring the overhanging foliage of the 
grassy banks. His agitations were like mountain torrents, leaping, 
dashing, thundering down their rugged courses, sweeping all before 
them. When composed, the ocean of his emotions was so placid that a 
little child might sail its fragile boat thereon ; but when agitated, the 
great deep was troubled, the heavens scowled, thunder answered thun- 
der, the ethereal fires gleamed and burned, wave mounted wave, and 
whole armaments were scattered before the fury of the storm. This is 
the key to the warmth of his friendship and the bitterness of his enmity. 
He had an honorable ambition, but it was above corruption and in- 
trigue. In his manliness he did not hesitate to proclaim his desire nor 
disguise his noble aspirations. From his very nature he became the 
soldier's friend. It was his tenderness of nature that made him the 
friend of every soldier in the war. In " these piping times of peace " 
we forget those who fought for us. Not so with Logan. He carried the 
years of the war through each receding decade, and lived among its stir- 
ring memories. He maintained close relations to the veterans. Thrice 
he was elected commander-in-chief of the Grand Army of the Republic. 
As chairman of the Committee on Military Affairs he was in a position 
of power. To-day 350,000 veterans in the Grand Army of the Republic, 
from 6,000 posts, feel that they have lost a friend. To-day 622,000 pen- 
sioners bless his memory. To-day 230,000 widows and orphans breathe 
a prayer to Heaven for the peace of his soul. And now the spirits of 
350,000 patriot soldiers, slain in the war, gather around the great soul 
of Logan, and thank him that on each returning 30th of May their 
graves are not forgotten, but are covered with flowers. The designation 
of that day for memorial service was suggested by Logan, and he was 
wont to say : " It was the proudest act of my life." And could the 
350,000 patriot dead rise from their graves, each with a memorial flower 
in his hand, there would rise a floral mountain to the skies, the perfume 
of which would ascend in gratitude to the God of battles. Logan 
deserves such a mountain of flowers. He himself is a martyr of liberty. 
Let me show those five scars of the wounds he received in battle for 
the love of his country. 



4 7 4 LIFE 0F LOGAN. 

Would you know him in his happier estate of gentleness, tenderness 
and affection, as husband and father, go to his home, where purity, peace, 
and love reigned supreme. There his inner life was displayed without 
restraint. There was his retreat from the vexatious cares of public life. 
There was wedded love of thirty-one happy years. She of his youthful 
pride and choice was his supreme and constant delight. He was her 
tower of strength ; she was the joy of his soul. He was her honorable 
pride ; she the confidant of his secret thoughts. He was faithful to his 
bridal vows ; she reciprocated his undivided love. Such a home was the 
dream of his life. Upon the western hills that overlook our National 
Capital, he found that sweet, sweet home, where he had hoped to spend 
yet many a happy year, and with Goldsmith sing : 

In all my wanderings round this world of care, 
In all my griefs, and God has given my share, 
I still had hopes my latest hours to crown, 
Amid these humble bowers to lay me down, 
To husband out life's taper to its close, 
And keep the flame from wasting by repose. 

Around my fire an evening group to draw, 
And tell of all I felt and all I saw, 
And, as a hare whom hounds and horns pursue, 
Pants to the place from whence at first he flew, 
I still had hopes, my long vacations past, 
Here to return, and die at home at last. 

Alas, that I must add : 

No more for him the blazing hearth shall burn, 
Nor busy housewife ply her evening care, 
Nor children run to lisp a sire's return, 
Nor climb his knee the envied kiss to share ! 

It is not possible for us to suppose for a moment, that a life so mag- 
nanimous and unselfish, and so beautiful in its domesticity, should be 
without the element of religion. Bluff, sturdy, honest, Logan was a 
Christian in faith and practice. Here is his Bible, which he read with 
daily care. Sincere and humble, he accepted Christ as his personal 
Saviour. When I gave him the sacrament of the Lord's Supper, too 
humble in spirit to kneel on the cushion around the altar, he knelt on 
the carpet, and, with his precious wife by his side, received the tokens 
of a Saviour's love. His manly brow shone like polished marble, for he 
felt that he was in the presence of the Searcher of all hearts. It was his 
last sacrament on earth. Let us hope that he will have a Eucharist in 
the skies. 

Standing by the tomb of Grant, on last Memorial Day, Logan de- 



LOGAN'S LAST DAYS AND DEATH. 



475 



livered an oration on immortality. He called upon the sphinxes, and 
the pyramids, of Egypt ; upon the palaces of Sennacherib and Nebu- 
chadnezzar ; upon the philosphers of Attica and the Campagna ; upon 
the mystic worshippers of the Druids, and the pictorial monuments of 
the Mexicans ; upon the poets and orators of the world, to witness that 
"hope springs immortal in the human breast," and demanded of them, 
" Why this longing after immortality ? " And, rising above all these in 
glory and authority, he turned to the Divine Prophet of Nazareth, and 
from His blessed lips received the sweet assurance : " Let not your 
heart be troubled, ye believe in God, believe also in Me. In my Father's 
house are many mansions ; I go to prepare a place for you." 

Logan has entered into the fruition of his immortality. He has an- 
swered the morning call of eternal life. He has translated his oration 
into a deathless experience. He has heard the Master say : " It is 
enough ; come up higher." 

At the conclusion of the funeral oration, Bishop Andrews 
pronounced the benediction ; and the Presiding Officer an- 
nounced that the procession would move in accordance with 
the printed " Order of the Day." 

THE FUNERAL PROCESSION TO ROCK CREEK CHURCH-YARD — « 
SERVICES AT THE TOMB — SOUNDING " TAPS " (LIGHTS OUT). 

From the Senate Chamber the funeral procession now 
slowly moved in due order to the east front of the Capitol. 
It was led by the Clergy and Medical attendants ; then came 
the honorary pall-bearers ; then the casket ; then the Com- 
mittee of Senate and House of Representatives ; then the af- 
flicted family and attendants ; the President's Cabinet, the 
Supreme Court, and the Diplomatic Corps followed ; then the 
body of Senators, followed by the Representatives with the 
Speaker at their head ; then Officers of the Senate, Governors 
of States and other invited persons ; and lastly the Com- 
mittees of the Grand Army of the Republic and other veterans. 

Meanwhile, " on the plaza to the east of the Capitol," 
says the Star, " were ranged the carriages which were to 
bear the various committees and the invited guests to the 
cemetery. Behind these were enfiled the military organiza^ 
ticns, which were to form the escort, standing at parade rest. 



4 - 6 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

Upon the high marble steps leading to the Senate and House 
wings were masses of people who had been unable to obtain 
entrance to the building, and who for an hour and more 
stood, exposed to the wintry air and the occasional gusts of 
snow and rain, awaiting the conclusion of the ceremonies in 
the Senate Chamber. As the casket, preceded by the pall- 
bearers, was borne slowly down the steps of the eastern front, 
the Marine Band played the hymn, ' Nearer, My God, to 
Thee.' Every head was uncovered as the casket was placed 
in the hearse, and the military came to a ' present arms.' 
Then the invited guests were conducted to the carriages, and, 
headed by the Marine Band playing a dirge, the procession 
started." It marched in the following order: 

Lieut. Gen. P. H. Sheridan, marshal ; chief of staff, Brevet Brig. 
Gen. Albert Ordvvay, United States volunteers, headed the line. Pla- 
toon of mounted police ; Aides-de-camp, Lieut. Col. M. V. Sheridan, 
U. S. A., Lieut. Col. Sanford C. Kellogg, U. S. A., Lieut. Col. Stan- 
hope E. Blunt, U. S. A., Brevet Major Emmett Urell, U. S. V. ; Car- 
riage containing Rev. Dr. Newman. 

First Division. — Division of Marine Band ; battalion U. S. Marine 
corps, with arms reversed ; Battalion of Third United States artillery, 
Col. H. G. Gibson ; Light Battery C, Third United States artillery, 
Capt. J. G. Turnbull. 

Second Division. — Division of Marine Band ; Detachment of U. S. 
seamen from U. S. S. Albatross, Lieut. Commander W. W. Rhoades ; 
District militia ; Union Veteran Corps ; Wilson Post, of Baltimore ; 
Grand Army of the Republic ; colored veterans. 

Third Division. — Detail of ten Capitol police, commanded by Cap- 
tain Allabaugh ; G. A. R. guard of honor ; Hearse drawn by four black 
horses; G. A. R. guard of honor; Carriages two abreast, containing 
Sergeant-at-Arms Canady, Deputy Sergeant-at-Arms Christie, the Sen- 
ate and House committees of arrangements, the family of General 
Logan, Senators, Representatives, officers of the army and navy, com- 
mittee of Mexican war veterans, committee of the military order of the 
Loyal Legion, committee of the Grand Army of the Republic, com- 
mittee of the Army of the Tennessee, and citizens of Illinois. The rear 
was brought up by five hundred clerks of the Pension office. 

The bleak and bitter wind, with heavy gusts of driving 
snow and sleet, together with the deep slush in the streets, 



LOGAN'S LAST DAYS AND DEATH. 



477 



conspired to make the march from the Capitol — to Pennsyl- 
vania Avenue, to 15th Street, to Vermont Avenue, to Rhode 
Island Avenue, to Seventh Street, and to Rock Creek Church- 
yard, far beyond the Boundary — a most trying one. Says 
the National Tribune : 

The procession was more than a mile in length. The veterans of the 
Grand Army made a superb appearance. Though the snow and water 
were ankle deep, they marched through it with regular steps, paying the 
last tribute to their illustrious comrade-in-arms. Crowds were gathered 
all along the line of the procession from the Capitol steps, down the 
hill, up Pennsylvania Avenue, and as far as the course of the proces- 
sion lay through the populous part of the city. The carriages were 
driven in double line, preceded by the various orders on foot. Multi- 
tudes were assembled on both sides of the avenue and along the car 
tracks, and no cars or other vehicles were allowed to cross the line of 
procession. 

At last the procession reached Rock Creek Church-yard, 
and here the remainder of the Burial Service and the impres- 
sive military ritual of the Grand Army of the Republic being 
rendered, the mortal remains of General Logan were tem- 
porarily committed to the vaulted tomb ; and then, as the loud 
and clear and long-sustained notes of the bugle rang out and 
died away again upon the chilly air of the last expiring day of 
the year 1886 — sounding "Taps" (lights out) — the casket, 
covered and surrounded by the beautiful floral tributes of the 
dead General's friends, was left to the charge of a military 
guard furnished from the Veterans of the Soldiers' Home. 

the effect of logan's death upon "washington society" 
— emily t. charles' poem on " the death of logan." 
The effect of General Logan's death upon the social life 
of the National capital was plainly visible in all of its many 
circles, and was fairly reflected in the Washington telegraphic 
correspondence of the I?iter- Ocean, December 30th, as fol- 
lows : 

Nothing is talked of in the city but the dead Senator and his stricken 
wife. General Logan's sturdy figure, bronzed face, and keen eyes have 



478 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

so long been an integral feature of Washington's social and political life 
that he is missed at every turn, and his wife is so popular in Washing- 
ton society that every tear she sheds falls heavy on the homes wherein 
she was always a welcome and honored guest. It seems more than 
strange to connect the idea of mourning with Calumet Place, for it is 
essentially what Maurice Egan calls "a house of sunset tints." Rich 
crimsons, warm yellows, clarets, wine-browns, and the brilliant tracery 
of wampum are the prevailing colors of the house, and an artist would 
fairly gloat over the Navajo blankets, the " live " tones of the Indian 
pottery, and the notable collection of native American weapons and 
curios gathered in the parlors. Wherever the Senator travelled on the 
frontier he won the good-will and affection of the Indians whose coun- 
try he traversed, and his only rival in their regard was his wife, whose 
beautiful olivart face, brilliant eyes, and silver-white hair stirred even 
their dull breasts to admiration. The effect on society has been marked ; 
every entertainment that was planned for the week has been postponed, 
except one or two private parties and the Secretary of the Treasury's 
dinner ; and the holiday-note that sounded so blithely is again drowned 
by the toll of the funeral-bell. 

But the mingled emotions of astonishment and sorrow at 
Logan's sudden death, of admiration for the illustrious soldier- 
statesman's remarkable career, and of love for the noble 
nature of the man, which were felt throughout the National 
capital — especially among the old Union soldiers — and found 
expression at every street-corner, in every car, on every side- 
walk, and in every home or other gathering, were perhaps 
better hinted at by Emily Thornton Charles, than by any 
other writer, in the following stirring lines, given to the public 
in the Washington Republican of December 29, 1866: 

DEATH OF LOGAN. 

[oration.] 

What ! Logan dead ! the grand, the free 

Untrammelled spirit of the West ; 
He lying low, at Death's decree, 

With folded hands across his breast ? 
Alas ! alas ! that it be said, 
The soldier-citizen is dead. 



LOGAN'S LAST DAYS AND DEATH. 479 

The statesman who, from Congress Hall, 

Nor waiting rank nor uniform, 
Swift hastened at his country's call 

To meet the battle's lurid storm ; 
To face the hurtling shower of lead, 
With musket armed, now lieth dead. 

Before the fort of Donelson, 

Commanding now a regiment, 
For three long days he fought and won, 

Though sure defeat seemed imminent. 
Brave men were ranked among the dead — 
To Logan, victory came instead. 

His regiments, like fiery wall, 

Yet firmly — hurling missiles — stood ; 
At length they saw loved Logan fall ; 

His side was bathed with streams of blood. 
Although a ghastly pallor spread 
Over his face, he was not dead. 

On glory's fields he won the day, 

And major-general became ; 
His path he marked, and hewed the way ; 

And honor's signet crowned his name. 
The warrior's laurels wreathed his head, 
And now — we mourn for Logan dead. 

" Why, Logan seemed invincible," 

I've heard the veteran soldiers say ; 
At Corinth, facing shot and shell, 

He wielded wondrous, potent sway ; 
"Your strong arms nerve for right," he said, 
" March bravely on " — grand Logan dead ! 

At Gibson's Port and Bayou Pierre, 

Still leading, General Logan, see ! 
The fight at Raymond, most severe, 

He won by dauntless bravery. 
From his assault the foemen fled 
At Champion Hills— great Logan dead ! 



4S0 LIFE OF IOGAN. 

His men at Vicksburg bore the brunt ; 

His heart beat high with patriot pride, 
When his the column at the front — 

"The Old Commander" at his side — 
That through the conquered city led, 
And raised the flag high overhead. 

At Resaca his fame resounds ; 

At Dallas, Logan's brilliant corps 
Repulsed the charge with "40 Rounds," 

And then, if need be, forty more. 
Where thick and fast the bullets sped 
He dashed, with all uncovered head. 

At Kenesaw 'gainst rocky wall, 

He led, to scale the mountain grim ; 

He saw his gallant soldiers fall — 
And with great tears his eyes grew dim ; 

Such tears as comrades now will shed 

Above the bier of Logan dead. 

It seems as only yesterday — 

I heard a war-scarred soldier tell, 

How grandly, Logan led the fray, 

On field where brave McPherson fell ; 

Inspired his men, and, shouting, said — 

" Revenge ! Revenge McPherson dead ! " 

McPherson ! still his battle-cry ; 

In front he galloped down the field ; 
With wind-blown hair and flashing eye : 

"Advance ! Advance ! Ye must not yield 
" Revenge, my boys," brave Logan said — 
"Revenge! Revenge McPherson dead." 

His desperate words, his courage rare, 
Thrilled every man with energy ; 

When, like a lion from his lair, 
He sprang, and led to victory — 

" I'll ne'er forget," the comrade said, 

"Atlanta's field, where Logan led." 



LOGAN'S LAST DAYS AND DEATH. 481 

Note well the man of firm intent, 

Whene'er ye look his record o'er ; 
Commanding either, regiment, 

Brigade, division, army, corps ; 
His valiant force, with fearless tread, 
To victory he always led. 

He organized — to keep alive 

The feelings of fraternity 
In breasts of those who yet survive — 

" The Army of the Tennessee." 
They mourn above the narrow bed 
Of Logan, sleeping with the dead. 

The people's ardent, constant friend ; 

In councils of the nation wise ; 
Soldier and statesman he did blend, 

And higher still his fame shall rise ; 
Though earth no more shall hear the tread 
Nor voice of him who lieth dead. 

I noted but the other day — 

He seemed so kindly used by time ; 
That lightly touched his hair with gray, 

And left him in his manhood's prime ; 
Yet pain has distanced time's swift tread, 
And touched his heart, and left him, dead. 

Grand Army of Republic, weep ! 

Thy "three times chief " hath passed away. 
He with the silent hosts doth sleep — 

Who set apart " Memorial Day." 
Thy memories shall mark the bed, 
Where lies the Chieftain, cold and dead. 

"He builded wiser than he knew," 

Who reared th' enduring monument 
Of flowers, fraternal hands e'er strew, 

For memory and sad lament. 
Rise, floral incense, o'er his head, 
Love's monument to Logan dead. 
31 



482 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

Rest, soldier, rest ! for peace is thine ; 

Rest, warrior ! for earth's strife is o'er ; 
Rest, statesman ! Fame's bright laurels twine 

Thy noble deeds — the golden shore 
For thee is won — while tears are shed 
For lion-hearted Logan, dead. 

HOW THE PRESS AND PEOPLE OF THE LAND MOURNED THE SAD 

DEATH OF LOGAN. 

That the sudden fatal termination of General Logan's last 
illness was a serious shock to the entire country, is proved 
not only by the avalanche of condolences already alluded to 
as pouring into Calumet Place, but by the fact that, with hard- 
ly an exception, the thousands of journals published in the 
United States, without regard to political complexion, at 
greater or less length, referred to the National bereavement, 
and dwelt, with more or less emphasis, upon the qualities and 
attributes of the illustrious soldier and statesmen, whose loss 
they were called upon to chronicle and mourn. A very small 
number of these utterances — and these only in the very 
briefest limits — are here given, as exemplifying the wide-spread 
popular sorrow, thus voiced by the press : 

In Congress, as well as in military campaigns, he was bold and 
aggressive, giving hard blows, nor complaining when they were re- 
turned in kind. He possessed a great fund of practical knowledge and 
knew how to make good use of it. He loved his country, and he loved 
to give her the best service which his large experience and rare ability 
qualified him for giving. If he was ambitious — " as who of us is not " 
— his ambition was worthy of his fame, and he sought to promote it by 
no unworthy means. — Washington National Republican (Rep.). 

The death of any man of large experience and influence in statecraft 
is a public calamity. In the case of General Logan the calamity is the 
greater because of his character, his position, and because of the ripen- 
ing possibilities of the future. He was the best living representative 
of the spirit of the old Union armies in political life. He had more 
steadfast, ardent followers among the veterans of the war than any 
• other leader of his party, and Republican sentiment in the West was 



LOGAN'S LAST DAYS AND DEATH. 483 

solidifying about him in a way that marked him as the chosen leader in 
the next Presidential campaign. To his party the loss is not only great, 
but far-reaching in effects. To the country at large the ioss is that of 
one of the most conspicuous figures in the war for the Union, one of 
the most courageous, most fearless, and most useful men in public life. 
General Logan was one of the remarkable individualities of the times. 
He was not like Lincoln, nor Douglas, nor Grant, nor Greeley, nor 
Sumner, nor Stanton. He was simply, straightforwardly, and positively 
John A. Logan. He was pre-eminently and unmistakably a positive 
force. — Chicago Inter-Ocean (Rep.). 

When General John A. Logan died the Republican Party lost its most 
aggressive partisan and the most picturesque character among its 
prominent public men. ... As a man of the people, he had his 
chief hold on the people, and the persistence with which he held his 
own against circumstances won him admiration, even from the opponents 
whom his own partisanship embittered toward him. . . • — St. Louts 
Republican (Dem.). 

General Logan was intensely American. Every fibre of his being 
pulsated for the old flag, American citizenship, and loyalty to the party 
which he believed had saved the Nation. ... His death comes like 
an electric shock to the country, and will cause wide-spread grief and 
universal mourning. Verily, a great man has passed away. — Minneapolis 
Tribune (Rep.). 

General Logan was an uncompromising partisan, but he had a good 
heart. There was nothing malevolent in his character. The country 
could far better have spared some reputed saint or actual iceberg in 
our politics than hot headed, ambitious, volcanic, but able, faithful, 
and generous " Black Jack," of Illinois.— Charleston News and Courier 
(Dem.). 

His great popularity, his brilliant participation in the bloody strug- 
gle between the North and the South, and his patriotic services in 
the Senate, united to the insurmountable opposition which exists in 
the bosom of a portion of the Republican party against the ponder- 
ous sway of Mr. Blaine, had, moreover, settled upon General Logan 
to fill a most important role in the future politics of the country. 
Public rumor had, in fact, designated him as the next Republican can- 
didate for the Presidency, and from certain acts of Mr. Blaine and his 
friends, it would appear that they beheld in him a formidable competi- 
tor for nomination as the next Republican candidate for the Chief 
Magistracy. — New York Las Novedades (Ind.). 



4 S 4 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

General Logan did not owe his commanding position to happy- 
accidents. He was the architect of his own honorable and distinguished 
career. In war a gallant soldier, in peace a forceful statesmen, at all 
times an ardent patriot, the key-note to his character appears in the state- 
ment that he was one who had the courage of his convictions and whose 
convictions were the outcome of hard, practical sense. — New York 
Tribune (Rep.). 

His friends he grappled to him with hooks of steel ; his enemies he 
inspired with wholesome fear and respect. He was easily, by virtue of 
the length and scope of his public service, the most illustrious citizen 
of Illinois, and his death leaves a void in the political and social life of 
the State which will not readily be filled, and the memory of a strong, 
rugged, masterful character, unique in its virtues as well as in its 
faults, which will not soon fade from the public mind. — Chicago Times 
(Dem.). 

As the memories of Grant and Lincoln are revered by millions of 
loyal Americans, so will the fame of Logan be cherished by every 
citizen whose love of country and admiration of the attributes of sterling 
manhood make him a worthy dweller under the beneficent institutions 
which Logan in battle and debate fought unceasingly to vindicate and 
preserve. — Brooklyn Union (Rep ). 

Posterity may deny General Logan a high place among the political 
leaders of his time, but it cannot take from him the fame due his 
energy, valor, and capacity as an officer in the war which won him the 
praise of General Grant, who pronounced him the best soldier and 
officer the volunteer service had given to the preservation of the Union. 
— Chicago News (Ind.). 

He was a splendid if not a great soldier, a remarkable politician, if 
not a statesman, a vigorous speaker, if not a learned or skilful orator, 
a firm friend, an open enemy, an extreme partisan, and, in an age of 
golden-calf worship and trickery, an honest man. His political associ- 
ates will mourn for him as a tower of strengtli fallen in their principal- 
ity. His political enemies will uncover their heads in the presence of 
death, that has suddenly smitten down an intrepid warrior and a 
doughty civic leader, the individual like of whom will not be seen in 
our day and perhaps for centuries to come. — Augusta, Ga., Chronicle 
(Dem.). 

When he receives what is his due he will be credited with the great- 
est and most timely service which a patriot ever rendered his country, 
because before the war-cloud burst upon the country he went out and 



LOGAN'S LAST DAYS AND DEATH. 485 

proclaimed to the Democracy, with whom he had influence, that it was 
the duty of the hour to sustain Abraham Lincoln. But for the timely 
efforts of Stephen A. Douglas, John A. Logan, and a few others, the re- 
sult of the war might have, yes, would have, been vastly different from 
what it was. — Boston Journal (Rep.). 

As a statesman, General Logan had few or no superiors among his 
contemporaries. His statesmanship was based on common-sense, his 
native acute intelligence, his familiar knowledge of the American peo- 
ple, based on actual observation and repeated personal contact with all 
classes, and on his reading of politics and history, which was both ex- 
tensive and thorough. He was a skilful, practical politician, and sel- 
dom missed the objects that his ambition coveted. — Chicago Journal 
(Rep.). 

He leaves to his family, his friends, and his party a record of which 
all may be proud — a career without blot or stain, and one which the 
young men of the country can be urged to emulate. — Pittsburg Chron- 
icle- Telegraph ( I n d. ). 

With the death of Logan one of the most prominent actors on the 
political proscenium disappears from the boards. — St. Louis Anzeiger des 
Weslens (Dem.). 

He had sufficient command of the English language to enable him 
to rank among the ablest debaters in either house of Congress. He 
was not an orator, and yet such was the energy of his reasoning, and 
such the vigor of his declamation, that he often rose to the height of 
eloquence. — Richmond Whig (Dem.). 

His important service to the Nation in the War of the Rebellion will 
always be remembered with gratitude, his almost constant employment 
in the national councils since the war marks the high esteem in which 
he was held by his State, and the cordial regard which he had secured 
from his associates in public life is a convincing tribute to his personal 
traits of character. — Boston Herald (Ind.). 

Had General Logan devoted less attention to the Presidential ticket 
in 1884, and more to the Senatorial struggle in Illinois, there would have 
been no doubt or trouble about his re-election. But with unselfish loy- 
alty and with true soldier spirit he went where duty called, never heed- 
ing, perhaps never caring how his personal interests might suffer. This 
was characteristic of the man. — Chicago Tribune (Rep.). 

Nature had been generous to him, and had endowed him with a he- 
roic soul, with an independent judgment, and with a vigorous eloquence 



486 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



which never failed to win the attention and the sympathy of those who 
heard him. He was a strenuous but a generous foe, nor was there in 
all the land any man more faithful than he to the friends he loved and 
to the cause he espoused. — New York Star (Dem.). 

Among the Volunteer officers of the great conflict he holds the fore- 
most place unless General Terry may be said to dispute the palm with 
him. This is sufficient for his enduring fame. Much less would satisfy 
most of us. He did not reach the goal of his ambition, but there are 
not above half a dozen on the list of Presidents of the Republic whose 
place in history any rational man would prefer to his. — New York 
Evening Post (Ind.). 

As a leader in the army, in the legislative halls, in all benevolent and 
charitable acts, as a private citizen and as an official, General Logan was 
ever ready to perform his full duty. — Wisconsin State Journal (Rep.). 

He was a patriot and a natural soldier. His career has always been 
marked by dash and gallantry, simplicity and directness, and dauntless 
courage. — Toledo Commercial (Rep.). 

There have been, and no doubt there are, greater men than General 
Logan, but there is not and never was a purer patriot or more sincere 
friend. . . . Happy and powerful must be the country that has for 
its citizens, defenders, and protectors, men like John A. Logan. — Indian- 
apolis Journal (Rep.). 

He was widely read and deeply where occasion sent him to the bottom 
of a subject. His speech was neither the polished granite of New 
England nor the flowery exuberance of the South, but a plain, vigorous 
English, pointed with the picturesqueness of the West.— Wheeling In- 
telligencer (Rep.). 

Too faithful, if anything, to his party, he has stood forth in the front 
ranks to meet the missiles of political opponents, and nobody ever ac- 
cused him of dishonesty, and it is equally true that nobody ever accused 
him of letting any contest go by default. — Lynn, Mass., Bee (Ind.). 

General Logan held in the War of Secession, in which he took an 
active part, the highly honorable distinction of the "Murat of the 
Union army." ... By General Logan's death the number of the 
possible Republican candidates for the next Presidency is diminished by 
a very considerable unit. — Der Deutsche Correspondent, Baltimore (Dem.). 

The loss of a wholesome, vigorous personality in politics like Gen- 
eral Loiran is one of the hardest blows that could be delivered to Amen- 



LOGAN'S LAST DAYS AND DEATH. 



487 



can public life at this period, when insincerity, deceit, and unworthiness 
aspire to and attain leadership in political thought only to barter it for 
personal gain. — Albany Evening Journal (Rep.). 

He was a strong partisan and was one of the last remaining relics of 
the old-time, thorough-going Republicans of the war and reconstruction 
periods, who believed implicitly in their party under all circumstances 
and as implicitly disbelieved in the Democrats, individually and col- 
lectively. — New York Commercial Advertiser (Rep.). 

He was tremendously in earnest, was incorruptibly honest through- 
out temptations which seduced abler as well as richer men, and was a 
model of conjugal affection. Such a record is a far richer legacy than 
money to bequeath to one's family. — New York Graphic (Dem.). 

Let the close analysts of human motives and methods say what they 
may of John A. Logan as a politician and a statesman, they cannot deny 
him the tribute which Americans as a nation are always ready to pay 
to the sincere patriot, the brave soldier, and the public man whose- 
hands and whose purse are not afraid of the daylight. — Washington, D.. 
C, Evening Star (Ind.). 

His hold upon the people was of the strongest. His methods were as 
effective as they were crude. . . . His sincerity was seldom ques- 
tioned. He will be remembered as an aggressive, manly, shrewd, per- 
tinacious politician — in many respects a representative American of the- 
West. — New York Sun (Dem.). 

Logan was a politician ere he became a soldier ; and resuming his; 
civic life, in doffing his soldier's uniform, he well knew how to make 
his political career a brilliant one. — New Yorker Staats Zeitung (Ind.). 

The memory of the veterans must ever be kept green, and among 
those whose manly qualities entitle them to the affectionate remembrance 
of all Americans the name of John A. Logan will not be overlooked. — 
Philadelphia Times, (Ind.). 

His finished career, like that of Lincoln, Grant, and Garfield, illus- 
trates anew the possibility of great achievement in this free land even 
by those whose conditions of early life are most adverse. . . . He 
was a man whom his country and his commonwealth, hardly less than 
his family, could ill afford to lose. — Milwaukee Wisconsin (Rep.). 

Especially will the death of the valiant Union soldier be mounned 
by the soldier element, with which he enjoyed an unusual popularity. 



488 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

The Republican party loses in Logan one of its truest and most loyal 
adherents. The people of the entire Union will lament the final de- 
parture of a brave champion of the Union, an honest and spotless poli- 
tician, and an upright man, whose memory they will always hold in the 
highest honor. — Cincinnati Volksfreund (Dem.). 

General Logan was a brave soldier and a capable commander — the 
ablest volunteer general of the war. — New York World (Dem.). 

Logan is one more gone of a type of vigorous men peculiar to our 
country. . . . He will appear to later generations a characteristic 
personality in the history of his times. — N. Y Morning Journal (Dem.). 

Logan was a gallant, heroic spirit, with a heart as true as steel, and 
it will not be easy to fill the void he leaves. — Philadelphia Press (Rep.). 

Senator Logan had many qualities to admire. . . . And he was 
thoroughly liked and admired in private life by his Congressional asso- 
ciates of all parties. He was incorruptibly honest, and no shadow of 
taint ever rested upon his good name, and not even suspicion assailed his 
integrity. — Nashville America?i (Dem.). 

. . . None of the abundant criticism invited by his public acts 
ever affected his patriotism, public virtue, or personal integrity. He re- 
mained singularly pure in an era when corruption was scarcely excep- 
tional, and a loose construction of public obligations the rule. . . 
He was a leader of men by the force of his personal character rather 
than by any talent for organization. . . . He will remain a pictu- 
resque and commanding figure in the history of his times. — St. Paul 
Press (Rep.). 

Whatever else may be said of his public life, all will admit that Lo- 
gan was honest, and what he was, he was. There was never any doubt 
as to where he stood. Take him in the two roles, both the military and 
the civil, as a soldier and statesman, he was by far the most conspicuous 
man of his party. What he did, he did with all his might. — Nashville 
Union (Dem.). 

His brilliant career in the War of Secession ended, General Logan re- 
entered political life, uniting himself to the Republican party ; and both 
in the Senate and House of Representatives of the National Legislature 
was always an influential and conspicuous figure. — New York LEco 
a" Italia (Ind.). 

He was a typical American. His education, what there was of it, 
was good, and he added to it continually by his ready observation and 



LOGAN'S LAST DAYS AND DEATH. 4S9 

adaptability. From the first he was prominent among his fellow-men. 
— Baltimore American (Rep.). 

No man is destitute of weaknesses and foibles. General Logan had 
his, and at times they were grave ones ; but in the end his bravery and 
high sense of right effaced them all, and leaves us a record of achieve- 
ment worthy of honor. — Boston Advertiser (Rep.). 

Logan was a gallant and capable soldier, but it cannot justly be said 
of him that he was a statesman. But it can and ought to be said of him 
that he was honest to the backbone, frank and outspoken, and, if ambi- 
tious, most honorably so. — New York Herald (Ind.). 

He had his faults, but they were of judgment, not intention. He 
had his enemies, but they respected him. He was often the victim of 
unjust aspersion and malignant attack, but he bore himself manfully 
and outlived them all. He had his ambitions, but they were honorable, 
and it is to his eternal glory that even his ambitions could tempt him to 
no dishonorable act. — Cleveland Plain Dealer (Dem.). 

Few public men have died in this country and been more sincerely 
mourned, and the amount of generous tributes which are being paid to 
Logan by political opponents is almost without precedent. — Baltimore 
Herald (Rep.). 

General Logan never did anything by halves. He was always a 
strong, earnest partisan. Before the war he was an intense Democrat. 
During the war he was a fighting general. After the war he was an 
uncompromising Republican. He was a brave, gallant man, in war or 
in politics. — Buffalo Courier (Dem.). 

Unswerving in loyalty to his country, great in the statesmanship that 
rescued it from the perils succeeding war, and kindly and gentle in all 
the relations of social life, General Logan fulfilled the ideal of the best 
type of American citizenship. — Detroit Tribune (Rep.). 

From the beginning to the end, he was most successful in winning 
and keeping posts of honor, both in war and peace. As a soldier he 
was resolute, clear-sighted and reliable, and gallant to a fault ; as a 
Senator, painstaking, industrious and conscientious. — Louisville Courier- 
Journal (Dem.). 

What John A. Logan, impetuous and vigorous, may have said as a 
Democrat, goes for naught when we consider what John A. Logan, as 
a Republican, did for his country during the struggle which drove sla- 
very out of the United States.— Wilmington, Del., News (Rep.). 



490 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

General Logan is worthy a place among the strong men of the 
passing generation who have so recently gone from life into history. — 
Boston Post (Dem.). 

John Alexander Logan was an able man, a fearless man, an honest 
man. He was a gallant soldier, and served his country in its hour of 
need. He was a conscientious, faithful legislator. What better record 
needs an American citizen to leave with his friends and countrymen? — 
Boston Globe (Dem.). 

It can be said of General Logan that he possessed in a very high de- 
gree the admiration and the confidence of the American people, and no 
one held a higher place in the affections of his comrades composing the 
Grand Army of the Republic. — Pittsburg Commercial Gazette (Rep.). 

It is a great deal to say, as can be truly said of him, that he was one of 
the bravest men, physically and morally, that ever lived, a brilliant and 
great volunteer soldier, an incorruptible citizen and legislator, and a 
patriot of rare intensity and enthusiasm. — Hartford Courant (Rep.). 

He commanded the respect of the best men of his own party and of 
the men of the opposition, whom he fought vigorously and courageously. 
He was a fine development of American institutions. He belonged to 
a race cast in a large mould, a race fast dying out. — Neiv York Mail and 
Express (Rep.). 

Concerning his rank as a statesman, opinions greatly differ ; but the 
frankness and sincerity of his character, the strength and devotion of 
his friendships, and the sturdy way in which he stood up for any cause 
he espoused, won the admiration of his countrymen. — Eastern Argus 
(Dem.). 

Altogether it has been a strange career and a great one. Force and 
brilliancy, courage and persistency, were his leading characteristics. But 
we have had few men who, living, were more respected and loved ; and 
we have few dead, to whose memory the Nation turns with such tearful 
grief and such affectionate reverence. — Cincinnati Enquirer (Dem.). 

So strong was the love of the old-soldier element for this former 
leader and later champion that it has desired him at the head of National 
affairs, and would have demanded him in such unmistakable terms that 
gladly would all the people have hearkened to the mighty voice and 
obeyed its behest. — Chicago Mail (Ind.). 

He was an excellent soldier of two wars, and a statesman of a quarter 
of a century's active service. . . . As a man he was upright, honest, 



LOGAN'S LAST DAYS AND DEATH. 



491 



bold, frank, and sincere ; as a legislator incorruptible, but generous ; as 
a soldier brave, skilful, and successful. — Netv Orleans Picayune (Dem.). 

At various times since the great campaign, political and personal 
enemies of our greatest citizen-soldier thoughtlessly asked, " Who will 
mourn for Logan now ? " . . .A Nation mourns for Logan now. — 
Youngstown, O., Telegram (Rep.). 

A brave fighter either in the field or forum, he stood for the name and 
glory of his country as long as he had life, and his death will raise a 
monument to his memory as lasting as the annals of his time. — New 
Brunswick, N. J., Fredonian (Rep.). 

His influence over the soldier vote was seen in 1884, and has been 
shown since by the enthusiasm he has aroused at various encampments 
of the Grand Army of the Republic. — Kansas City Times (Dem.). 

Both as soldier and Senator, Logan represented a type of character 
that is not common in this generation. But it is to be hoped that the 
type that succeeds him will have the ability to fight for its ideas as well 
as he did. — Pittsburg Dispatch (Ind.). 

In the counsels of the Nation he was listened to with uniform respect, 
and in the affections and esteem of his party he had won such eminent 
place as to be looked upon as one of the most prominent of its honored 
leaders. — Philadelphia North American (Rep.). 

With the leaders as with the rank and file of his party, he was strong 
— stronger, perhaps, than any other man his party's convention could 
have chosen two years ago — stronger, perhaps, than any other man his 
party's convention can choose two years hence. — Richmond State (Dem.). 

His contest with Ohio Republicans, and theirs with him, are ended. 
. . . But they will never forget his splendid service in the field, nor 
the general wholesomeness of his public career, and they will stand 
among the sincerest mourners at his grave. — Cm. Commercial Gazette (Rep.). 

The features of General Logan's character upon which it is pleasantest 
to dwell at this time are the fearlessness with which he gave utterance 
to his convictions, whatever they might be, and his sterling integrity. — 
Florida Times-Union (Dem.). 

Logan was the soldier's friend and advocate more distinctively than 
any other public character of the period since the war. The Republican 
ticket of 1884 reversed, and the result would have been in greater doubt 



49 2 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

or no doubt at all. His death brings a shock to all. — Milwaukee Journal 
(Ind.). 

The country loses in the departure of one trained in the school of so 
many activities, and the Republican party will greatly miss a leader who 
was instant in its service and devoted to the utmost of his nature. — 
Springfield Republican (Ind.). 

Senator Logan was a man of marked individuality, that showed itself 
in both the military and civil sides of his career, in both of which he won 
high rank. — Montreal Gazette (Cons.). 

He was a son of Illinois, born on her soil and reared boy, youth, and 
man among her people. He was friend and neighbor, as well as the 
honored citizen. He was the best known, the best loved, the first favor- 
ite in the family of favorite sons, and his death will be most deeply 
mourned. — Illinois State Journal (Rep.). 

He was in the maturity of his powers, and his long experience in pub- 
lic life and native abilities made him one of the foremost and strongest 
men in the Senate. — Concord, N. H., Monitor (Rep.). 

We have no hesitation in saying that the whole country — North and 
South — regarded General Logan with more respect and honor at the 
close of the Presidential canvas than when it opened. — Petersburg, Va., 
Index-Appeal (Dem.). 

From the beginning of the war, when his life came into prominence, 
his character has been uniformly consistent. He was a patriot of the 
most intense nature. — Pittsburg Press (Rep.). 

If not so accomplished and cultivated as some of his political com- 
peers and associates, he was a strong and courageous man, who always 
commanded the confidence of his friends and the admiration of the 
people. — Macon, Ga., Telegraph (Dem.). 

As a commanding general in the army, his record forms a large and 
enduring part of the history of the War for the Constitution. . . . 
In times of corruption he was incorruptible. In times of public exi- 
gency he was never timid or irresolute. — Washington, D. C, Critic (Ind.). 

The country is never so well supplied with worthy men that the loss 
of such a man as Logan will not be severely felt. — St. Louis Globe-Demo- 
crat (Rep.). 



PART VII. 



ADDENDA. 



GENERAL LOGAN'S INFLUENCE UPON OUR STATUTE-BOOK THE 

IMPRESS OF HIS THOUGHT ON ALL IMPORTANT LEGISLATION 
ENACTED SINCE THE WAR OF THE REBELLION. 

It would fill many pages to give merely a list of the 
legislative measures which were originated or perfected 
by General Logan, and are now upon the statute-book. 
Scarcely a measure of National importance has been passed 
by Congress during the nearly twenty years since the sup- 
pression of the Rebellion, whether upholding and strengthen- 
ing the public credit and touching finances generally, or 
respecting the reconstruction and rehabilitation of the insur- 
rectionary States, the retrenchment and reduction of govern- 
mental expenses, the reform of abuses in the machinery of 
Government, the various appropriation bills, measures look- 
ing to pensions and their increase, and the equalization of 
bounties, the tariff or the internal revenue, the civil service, 
army reform, currency and national banks, internal improve- 
ments, railroad subsidies, public lands, Indian affairs, the 
education of the masses, that does not bear the impress of 
his brain and hand. And this could hardly be otherwise 
when we consider his knowledge of affairs, his fervid patri- 
otism, the fertility and grasp of his mind, and the restless 
energy that always distinguished him, in connection with the 
long period of his services in both Houses of Congress after 
the war, and the important committees on which he was ac- 



494 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

tively engaged. Thus, in the House, he was on the Commit- 
tee of Ways and Means and Joint Committee on Ordnance 
from March, 1867, to March, 1869; from that time until March, 
187 1, on the Pacific Railroad Committee, as well as chair- 
man of the Military Committee. In the Senate, from March, 
187 1, to March 26, 1873, he served on the committees on 
Privileges and Election, Public Lands, Mines and Mining, 
Pensions, and Military Affairs, of which latter he became 
chairman by the resignation of Senator Wilson (upon his 
election to the Vice-Presidency of the United States), be- 
sides beine on the Select Committee on the sale of arms to 
France during the Franco-Germanic war ; his services on 
the Committee on Privileges and Elections and as chairman 
of the Military Committee continuing to March 3, 1875. 
The following two years, besides being chairman of the Mili- 
tary Committee, he was also on the Finance Committee as 
well as Privileges and Elections, and the Select Committee 
on Counting the Electoral Vote. From December, 1879, to 
March, 1881, he was on the committees on Privileges and 
Elections, Military Affairs, Indian Affairs, the Territories, 
and the Select Committee to examine the several branches 
of the Civil Service. From that time (except during the 
brief interregnum between March 4, 1885, and his re-elec- 
tion,) until his death he served as chairman of Military Af- 
fairs, as well as (most of that time) on the Judiciary Commit- 
tee, Committee on Appropriations, Indian Affairs, the Select 
Committee to examine into the condition of the Sioux Ind- 
ians, and the Select Committee on the improvement of the 
Mississippi River. The pages of this work give evidence of 
the effectiveness of General Logan's speeches. But if he 
spoke well, he worked still better. Said the Sonoma (Cal.) 
Index, December 18, 1880, of him : 

He has more than once declined a foreign appointment, as also a 
Cabinet portfolio. Logan is one of the most useful men in the United 
States Senate ; he makes few speeches, but is always working for his 



ADDENDA. 495 

constituents. Not only his own State, but the whole Mississippi Val- 
ley, receives the benefit of his watchful care ; he has secured more and 
larger appropriations for the entire region drained by the Mississippi 
than have any half-dozen other Senators combined. No man under- 
stands more fully the condition of public affairs, and none is more 
watchful of the public welfare. 

secret of logan's popularity with the farmer, the la- 
borer, THE SOLDIER, THE COLORED MAN, AND THE IRISH 
VOTER. 

General Logan's attitude on all the burning questions of 
the two past decades were known of all men. Hence his 
great popularity with the farmer, with the laborer, with the 
veteran soldier, with the colored man, with the Irish voter. 
His strength with the Irish citizen grew out of the fact that 
he had Irish blood in his veins, and had shown sympathy for 
that race in whatever of wrong they may have suffered. His 
efforts to distribute the $60,000,000 of annual revenue to the 
States and Territories in the ratio of their population, in the 
cause of education, made him strong with the laboring ele- 
ment, which he desired to benefit and exalt. No man stood 
better with the working-classes than he. Said the St. Louis 
Mining News, before his nomination for the Vice-Presi- 
dency : " Senator Logan expended $50,000 in trying to de- 
velop coal in Illinois. Though the venture was unsuccessful, 
the Senator did not mourn the loss of the money, because 
the mining people got it. He is the advocate of laws for the 
protection of the lives of miners while underground ; and he 
would receive the miners' vote, which is a big thing in this 
country." Said the Springfield (111.) Monitor, August, 
1881 : "To see John A. Logan (at Carbondale) with a 
wide-brimmed straw hat, blue woollen shirt, and butternut 
pants on, astride of his favorite, 'Dolly,' going backward and 
forward to his wheat-fields, and while there, taking a hand 
' shocking ' after his twine-binders, is a sight which every 



49 6 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

constituency of Senators is not permitted to witness. After 
a hard day's work in the field with the boys, he lies on the 
grass with them in the evening, while lemonade is freely 
passed around, and all hands join in discussing the news of 
the day. This is John A. Logan at home, and yet some 
people wonder why it is that he has such a hold on the 
boys." A farmer himself, he knew what legislation the 
farmers wanted, and did his best to secure it for them, 
whether through protection or otherwise. Said the Jones- 
boro' (111.) Gazette: "He is in favor of improving the Mis- 
sissippi and Ohio Rivers, and making them the great thor- 
oughfares by which our grain can be sent to the European 
markets. He also favors a ship-canal from Chicago to the 
Mississippi River." In consequence of his attitude on these 
questions, had he been placed at the head of the Republican 
Presidential ticket, he would have made a great run through- 
out the Mississippi Valley States. That he would also have 
brought out the colored vote everywhere, cannot be doubted. 
Evidences of his broad views of those rights of man which 
are at the very root of our liberties are to be found every- 
where in his speeches and votes — from that July day in 1865, 
when at the court-house of Louisville, Ky., he made his 
impassioned and eloquent plea for the emancipation of the 
slaves and the consent of Kentucky to the Constitutional 
Amendment prohibiting slavery and involuntary servitude, 
down to his lamented death. Not only, as we have seen, 
was he the final drafter of the Fifteenth Amendment to the 
Constitution, but ever since the war he strenuously worked 
and spoke for civil rights and their exercise, and he believed 
in enforcing them. In one of his speeches at Indianapolis he 
said : " Now we have given these people all of these rights. 
If we do not intend to protect them in the enjoyment of 
these rights we should not have given them. I say to you 
to-night that the Southern Democrats have got to quit 
murdering Republicans, no matter whether they are white or 






ADDENDA. 497 

black." In another of his utterances in 1880, touching the 
question of " the rights of citizens to protection in the exer- 
cise of their political rights under our form of Government," 
after quoting the Fourteenth Amendment and showing the 
fallacy of the reasoning of those who hold that the National 
Government has ample power and would exercise it to the 
extent of war,, if need be, to protect the American citizen on 
foreign soil, but has no power to protect the American citizen 
on our own soil, he said : " It would be quite as reasonable 
to say you cannot protect your property on your own farm, 
but as soon as it is safely placed on your neighbor's you may 
do so, even to the shedding of blood. I think the people of 
this or any other Government would prefer to have protec- 
tion at home rather than be compelled to go to foreign soil 
for it. I do not agree to this latter doctrine for a moment. 
The fabric of our Government is not so weak as this. It is 
a Government clothed by the people with sovereign powers, 
through which justice can be administered, domestic tran- 
quillity preserved, the common defence provided for, the gen- 
eral welfare promoted, the blessings of liberty secured to all, 
and its citizens at home and abroad protected in all the rights 
pertaining to them as citizens of the Republic ; and unless 
the authority shall be asserted under the Constitution and 
laws to do this, there is great danger menacing the Repub- 
lic." The colored people knew that Logan spoke as he 
thought and acted as he spoke; that had the Providence 
of God devolved upon him the duties of Chief Executive, 
Copiah assassinations and Danville massacres would have 
ceased; that he would have found a way under the Con- 
stitution as it is and the laws as they are, to protect them 
in their political rights, of which they have so long been de- 
frauded by Southern Democrats. As to the soldier vote, — 
that vote which is cast, not alone by the soldiers themselves, 
but by their relatives and friends as well ; that prodigious 
vote, which goes into the millions, — without a doubt it would 

3 2 



498 LIFE OF IOGAN. 

have gone solid for the Presidential ticket headed by the 
honored name of Logan, the soldier's friend par excellence. 
Not one of the veterans would have forgotten — aside from 
the common glories which he shared with them on the battle- 
field, in the siege, or on the dreary march — how he after- 
ward worked year in and year out for them in both branches 
of Congress, in the matter of pensions, arrears of pensions, 
and equalization of bounties ; nor how, regardless of time, 
trouble, and expense, he corresponded with them and urged 
their cases to prompt settlement ; nor the fact that no crip- 
pled soldier nor soldier's widow nor orphan ever appealed to 
him for help, so far as it was possible for him to help, in vain. 
Letters by the hundreds — not from Illinois alone, but from 
all parts of the Union — came daily in his mail from the sol- 
diers or their survivors, and obliged him to keep several 
clerks to attend to them. These things would not have 
been forgotten by the old soldiers. 

And then the people, — aye, the people ! — can it be sup- 
posed for an instant that they would have forgotten the great 
soldier who fought so gallantly to preserve to them the Na- 
tion and their great heritage of freedom ? They had watched 
General Logan's course with interest since the war. They 
knew that he was an able man, a courageous man, a sincere 
man, a frank and honest and manly man, a magnetic leader. 
They could not forget the record of John A. Logan's useful 
public life, nor that it fully kept step, word for word, with 
that grand declaration of his belief in the people and his own 
dedication to their service : 

The People are Honest, the People are Brave, and 
the People are True. . . . While I Live I will Stand as 
their Defender. Living or Dying, I shall Defend the 
Liberties of this People, making War against Dictation 
and against Aristocracy, and in Favor of Republicanism. 



ADDENDA. 499 



THE CHARGE THAT LOGAN " MURDERED THE KING S ENGLISH 

DISPOSED OF HIS SPEECHES " BEDS OF PEARLS " A RANDOM 

STRING OF THEM. 

It has often been said by the enemies of General Logan 
that he " murdered the king's English," — that he could not 
speak grammatically, — although they long since abandoned 
their other pet falsehood, that he did not make his own 
speeches. He knocked down too many Democrats in brill- 
iant impromptu debate in both Houses of Congress for any 
of his most inveterate enemies to pretend to believe that his 
speeches were not his own. But they still fell back on the 
other falsehood, that he could not speak with nice grammati- 
cal precision. Now the fact of the matter is, that General 
Logan as a college-graduate ought to have been, and was, 
able to write and speak with as much accuracy as any other 
college-bred man. It may be that instances can be found in 
some of his speeches where the wonderful rush of his ideas 
slightly tripped the tongue. What of that? It has always 
been the same with every great extempore speaker who has 
not previously studied and committed to memory his phrases. 
The main difference between Logan and other great speak- 
ers of the past and present is, that the latter have been care- 
ful to correct their speeches after delivery and before pub- 
lication, while the former cared solely for the effect he 
produced on his auditors at the time of delivery. His 
speeches, like his battle-charges, are full of impetuous ear- 
nestness — full of brave and weighty thoughts uttered for 
some noble and always patriotic object. If he could sway 
the thronging multitudes with the magnetism of his person 
and the magical force of his reasoning and fervid eloquence, 
what cared he for the applause of the scholastic dilettanti ? 
In battle or on the stump, where rough-hewn Western forms 
of expression are often the most effective, in the Senate or at 
the bar, what mattered the battle-cry, the storied illustration, 



5oo 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



the cogent logic, the compact argument, so long as the enemy 
was beaten, the audience captivated, the legislative measure 
carried or defeated, the judge or jury convinced ? These 
were his objective points always in every field of effort ; aim- 
ing, not at the mere reputation of a precise regulation-soldier, 
a carefully finished stump-speaker, a Senatorial phrase-orator, 
or an ornate authority on jurisprudence, but rather at times 
with the half contempt of a man who had excelled on so 
many and such diverse fields of thought and action, ignoring 
the studied graces of precise diction and rushing on to vic- 
torious and valuable results. And yet, despite this constant 
and torrent-like sweep of his ideas that affected and even 
agitated to their very depths every audience and every tribu- 
nal that he ever personally addressed — a sweep of ideas so 
powerful and varied and rapid that it is surprising that his 
tongue could fitly weave them into a consecutive entirety — 
there are wonderfully few slips of the tongue or involved 
sentences in the hundreds of Logan's speeches that have 
passed beneath the eye of the writer. Sometimes, owing to 
bad punctuation of the reporter, sentences may have seemed 
involved which were clear and penetrating as sunlight when 
they left the speaker's lips. But even these instances are rare. 
On the other hand, the writer can think of no living Ameri- 
can in whose speeches can be found more passages of genu- 
ine eloquence than are to be found in those of General 
Logan. His comparatively few set speeches and orations, 
which he has carefully studied and written in advance, are 
full of passages classically perfect, — perfect gems in their way, 
—equal in all respects to passages in the proudest efforts of 
either modern or ancient orators. Take, for instance, por- 
tions of his remarkable speech, heretofore quoted from in 
this work, in the Andrew Johnson impeachment case before 
the Senate of the United States. Some of them move along 
in stately majesty as grandly as the Statement of Grievances 
sent by the Fathers of the Republic to King George the 



ADDENDA. 



50I 



Third, or as the glorious Declaration of Independence itself. 
Again, take that part of his speech, in answer to the impos- 
ing welcome with which he was received at Washington after 
his re-election to the United States Senate, which illustrates 
the value, to future generations, of human life-work, by the 
poetical allusion to the microscopic remains of shell-life pre- 
served for eons in the limestones and marbles of which the 
Capitol — our Temple of Liberty — is built, and say then if it 
is not a gem of beauty. Take his magnificent Fourth-of-July 
oration at Clinton, in 1874, with its wealth of historical re- 
search and depth of philosophical patriotic thought, and an- 
swer where else can you find as much broad statesmanship, 
or as many grand thoughts, in equally good diction. In 
some of his speeches, like that at Morris, September 1, 1868, 
are bits fully as dramatic as scenes from Shakespeare's 
tragedies. And what movement and fire is there in his vivid 
descriptions of the battles fought for the preservation of the 
Union ; as, for instance, that of Atlanta, when brave Mc- 
Pherson fell ! It may be said with literal truth of his speeches, 
that they are, like that grand plea for the civilization of the 
Indian, or his great oration upon Grant, well-stocked beds of 
rhetorical pearls. Pearls of wit and wisdom, of philosophy, 
patriotism, poetry, and common-sense are to be found among 
them everywhere — quite equal to the few of them which the 
writer has hastily culled and here presents in the precise 
shape in which they were uttered, with a view to showing 
how ridiculously false is the statement that John A. Logan 
could not speak good English, or spoke it without regard to 
grammatical construction : 

The smile of peace is sweet. 

Capital is proverbially timid. Man is easily persuaded that his es- 
tate is in danger. 

If man is unable to govern himself, he must wear the chains of sla- 
very that tyrants forge for his limbs, and can never be free. 

Our Government is based upon the proposition that governments 



502 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

are designed not for the benefit of those who govern, but for the benefit 
of those governed — " the greatest good to the greatest number." 

That man can be neither a patriot nor a good citizen who is willing 
to accept a benefit that he knows will inure to the injury of his country. 

Wealth will follow population. 

Private prosperity is public power. 

The institution of slavery dwarfs the physical proportions of the 
State, dries up the blood in its veins, withers the flesh in its bones, and 
wastes it gradually away. 

Leaving out of view the moral question involved in slavery, you 
may admit, for the sake of the argument, that slavery is morally and 
constitutionally right. Even then the question recurs, Could any man 
be a patriot who would perpetuate an institution that has shown itself 
to be the enemy of prosperity in our land ? 

Lycurgus . . . insisted that children are the property of the 
State. There is but one use to which the State can put children ; that 
is, to educate them. 

Intelligence is Heaven's rarest gift to earth. It is that attribute 
that gives man a claim to an affinity with angels ; and that State is 
false to her most sacred trusts, as well as to her most vital interests, 
that fails to develop all of her mental resources. 

I feel that it is the memory of those who fought and fell under our 
flag, who charged rebel batteries, carried rebel heights, vanquished rebel 
legions, and finally crushed the rebellion, that has a claim upon our re- 
spect, care, and veneration, far above office-seekers and political partisans. 

Presidents rarely owe their success to their enemies. 

Paradoxes do not amount to phenomena. 

Forgiveness is not so cheap a virtue that it may be prodigally 
wasted upon the idle and indifferent. The forgiveness that anticipates 
repentance will multiply crimes faster than it will reform criminals. 

Sickly sentimentality is a great crime-breeder. 

Impunity for one crime provokes the perpetration of many. 

Whenever the sword has entered any free and enlightened nation to 
destroy it, as the nation suffered so has its civilization and Christianity 
suffered. 

Wherever rebellion has destroyed governments liberal in their 
forms, there civil and religious progress has been blighted. 

Where liberty is destroyed, Christianity sinks into darkness. 

Civilization follows the Bible ; liberty and Christianity go together. 
If one dies, the other dies also. 

The man who lays down his fortune and life for his country is a 
happy man. 



ADDENDA. 



503 



The man who dies a patriot falls, if he falls a Christian, to rise 
again. 

In God's name let us respect and love the dead who have died for 
us. 

Remember that aristocracy is not morality, nor wealth wisdom. 
Arrogance is not dignity, nor ostentation happiness. " In the sweat of 
thy face thou shalt eat thy bread," is a fiat of the Great Lawgiver, and 
upon the industry that yields obedience to that irrevocable decree 
Heaven has promised to smile. 

The drafts you draw on your future time cannot be liquidated in 
the spurious currency of "good intentions," but must be redeemed in 
the hard coin of positive and continuous exertion. 

Action is indispensable to success. 

Obloquy is the price of success ; exemption from it the prerogative 
of failure. 

In the path of an indomitable will, obstacles are but stepping-stones. 

A good education will not come to you like a flash of sunlight to 
the mind. Energy and constant application are necessary. These are 
the main approaches to the great store-house of useful knowledge, 
where, when the bolted doors are broken down by a succession of as- 
saults, a great feast awaits you. 

We are a nation of laborers, a community of toilers. We should 
have no class interests inimical to the general good in this free country. 

All legitimate interests should be fostered, and labor, which is the 
rock upon which is built our national wealth and power, should be 
protected in all the rights which belong to it, and elevated to a recog- 
nized position of honor and dignity. 

If in our lives and death we can contribute a single atom to the 
great temple of human freedom and progress, we shall have left foot- 
prints of our existence which the march of all the coming centuries will 
not be potent to obliterate. 

The human mind does not revolve, but progresses in a straight line 
toward the great centre of ultimate perfection. 

I despise the narrow idea of locality. I know no boundary-lines 
except those beyond which the title of American citizen is lost. 

I will go as far as any man properly can go to accomplish unity and 
fraternity among the people of the States, but I will not consent to the 
crucifying of the National life upon the stunted tree of State Sover- 
eignty. 

Everything makes a history and marks out a path as it passes down 
the avenues of time. It has been beautifully said that the plant and 
the pebble are both attended by their own shadows. The drop of water 



504 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

falling from the clouds leaves its imprint upon the sand, and the stone, 
which rolls from the mountain-top scratches its course to the very bot- 
tom. The mighty river as it flows majestically along, marks the banks 
which hedge it in, and leaves the imprint of its torrent upon the rocks 
which intercept its course. In every aspect in which we view the 
works of nature, we find them leaving their own history for the benefit 
of the future. 

It is better to trust those who are tried than those who pretend. 

Our Government will be destroyed, if it is ever destroyed, by igno- 
rance. If the people are educated, the Government will stand unshaken 
through every trial. 

The educated man will think, and if his heart is educated will feel, 
and " out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaketh." 

Below the sacred cross waves the flag of freedom, the former forever 
overlooking the latter. 

The people are honest, the people are brave, the people are true. 
. . . While I live I will stand as their defender. Living or dying, I 
shall defend the liberties of this people, making war against dictation, 
and against aristocracy and in favor of Republicanism. 

Our Government is based, theoretically and practically, upon a 
proper compromise between perfect individual liberty and centralized 
power. 

The nullification and disobedience of law is one of the first steps in 
the direction of disintegration and dissolution. 

'Tis true the grave in its silence gives forth no voice, no whispers of 
the morrow ; but there is a voice borne upon the lips of the morning 
zephyrs that lets fall a whisper quickening the heart with a knowledge 
that there is an abode beyond the tomb. 

That evil will ever go side by side with good in this world, experi- 
ence gives us no reason to doubt. 

We have received from our ancestors and from the present genera- 
tion of philosophic scientists a body of knowledge and wisdon, the worth 
of which even genius can scarcely estimate. Let that be given to every 
child that breathes our atmosphere, in substantially the same spelling- 
book and primer, in schools as good among the snows of Aroostook, as 
in marts of New York, Boston, or Charleston ; as free on the shores of 
Puget Sound as on the prairies of Illinois, and as well-taught in the 
rice-fields of the South as on the hills of Connecticut. Then we shall 
be " one and inseparable, now and forever." 



ADDENDA. 



505 



LOGAN S LITERARY TASTES AND TREASURES EXTENT OF HIS 

CLASSICAL AND OTHER KNOWLEDGE HOW HE PREPARED 

HIS SPEECHES. 

Congressman Thomas of Illinois is reported in the Cleve- 
land Leader as saying, prior to the General's last illness : 

General Logan has, perhaps, with one exception, the finest private 
library in Illinois. He has 5,000 volumes, and among them are many- 
old and very rare books. You have heard of the book of Jeshur. 
There are, I understand, only three copies in the country, and Logan 
has one of them. Another is in the possession of the Lennox Library 
in New York, and another in the Crocker library in San Francisco. 
Logan was a long time in finding his. He had agents looking for it in 
different parts of Europe, but he finally stumbled across it himself one 
day while looking over the stock of an old second-hand bookseller on 
the Strand in London. He has also many rare copies of the Bible, and 
his theological library is very complete. He delights in theological 
study, and has read closely not only the Christian religion, but the 
works of Confucius, the Koran, and the Hindoo Bible. He likes to 
discuss the doctrinal points of Christianity, but, as I said before, all of 
his belief tends to that of the Methodists. His wife is largely interested 
in charity and church work. John A. Logan has also been a great 
reader of history. He has read all of the classics in translation, if not 
in the original, and has a wide scope of general knowledge. In his prep- 
aration for his speeches he never writes and commits what he is going 
to say, but studies the subject well and formulates his speech in his 
mind before he takes the floor. In other words he makes up the skele- 
ton and trusts to the inspiration of the moment to put flesh on the 
bones. 

WHY SHERMAN DISPLACED LOGAN FROM COMMAND OF THE ARMY 
OF THE TENNESSEE AFTER LOGAN'S GREAT VICTORY OF AT- 
LANTA THE SHERMAN-LOGAN CORRESPONDENCE SHERMAN^ 

ORAL AND WRITTEN STATEMENTS SINCE LOGAN'S DEATH 

HITHERTO UNPUBLISHED LETTERS OF SHERMAN TO HALLECK 

AND TO LOGAN HIMSELF THE REAL REASONS FOR SHERMAN'S 

INJUSTICE. 

That General Logan keenly felt the injustice of Sherman's 
action in securing the appointment of Howard to the perma- 



5 o6 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

nent command of the Army of the Tennessee, when Logan 
had so signally demonstrated his own capacity to command 
it, both at and after the great victory of Atlanta, is known to 
all who have ever talked with him on the subject, — the writer 
among them ; and it must be equally evident to all who have 
read the various attempts since made by General Sherman 
to explain away his singular conduct in this affair, that the 
latter has always had since then, and still has, an unquiet 
consciousness of it himself, which is ever impelling him to 
fresh attempts to justify it.* 

* Thus, no sooner was Logan dead, than Sherman's unquiet conscience forced him to 
address a letter (December 28, 1886) to Whitelaw Reid, for publication in the New York 
Tribune, (in which it appeared January 1, 1887,) wherein, after mentioning some compli- 
mentary after-dinner remarks made by Logan concerning Sherman at a banquet given to the 
latter at Washington, February 8, 1883, by District- Attorney Corkhill, in anticipation of 
Sherman's retirement from active command in the army, he made public a private corre- 
spondence which had afterward passed between them as follows : 

"Washington, D. C, Sunday, February n, 1883. 
"General John A. Logan, U. S. Senate, Washington, D. C. 

" Dear General : This is a rainy Sunday, a good day to clear up old scores, and I 
hope you will receive what I propose to write in the same friendly spirit in which I offer it. 

" I was very much touched by the kind and most complimentary terms in which you 
spoke of me personally at the recent Corkhill banquet, on the anniversary of my sixty-third 
birthday, and have since learned that you still feel a wish that I should somewhat qualify 
the language I used in my Memoirs, volume 2, pages 85 and 86, giving the reasons why 
General O. O. Howard was recommended by me to succeed McPherson in the command of 
the Army of the Tennessee, when by the ordinary rules of the service the choice should 
have fallen to you. I confess frankly that my ardent wish is to retire from the command of 
the army with the kind and respectful feelings of all men, especially of those who were with 
me in the days of the civil war, which must give to me and to my family a chief claim on 
the gratitude of the people of the United States. 

"I confess that I have tortured and twisted the words used on the pages referred to, so 
as to contain my meaning better without offending you, but so far without success. I hon- 
estly believe that no man to-day holds in higher honor than myself the conduct and action 
of John A. Logan from the hour when he realized that the South meant war. Prior to the 
war all men had doubts, but the moment Fort Sumter was fired on from batteries in 
Charleston these doubts dissipated as a fog, and from that hour thenceforth your course was 
manly, patriotic, and sublime. Throughout the whole war I know of no single man's career 
more complete than yours. 

"Now as to the specific matter of this letter. I left Vicksburg in the fall of 1863 by 
order of General Grant in person, with three divisions of my own corps (15th) and one of 
McPherson's (16th) to hasten to the assistance of the Army of the Cumberland (General 
Rosecrans commanding) which according to the then belief had been worsted at Chicka- 
mauga. Blair was with us, you were not. We marched through mud and water four hun- 



ADDENDA. 



507 



In his "Memoirs" (Vol. II., pp. 85-86) General Sher- 
man undertakes to justify his conduct, and quiet his con- 
science, in these words : 

But it first became necessary to settle the important question of who 
should succeed General McPherson. General Logan had taken com- 
mand of the army of the Tennessee by virtue of his seniority, and had 

dred miles from Memphis, and you joined me on the march with an order to succeed me in 
command of the 15th Corps, a Presidential appointment, which Blair had exercised tempo- 
rarily. Blair was at that time a member of Congress, and was afterward named to command 
the 17th Corps, and actually remained so long in Washington that we had got to Big Shanty 
before he overtook us. Again after the battles of Missionary Ridge and Knoxville, when 
Howard served with me I went back to Vicksburg and Meridian leaving you in command of 
the 15th Corps along the railroad from Stevenson to Decatur. I was gone three months, and 
when I got back you complained to me bitterly against George H. Thomas, that he claimed 
for the Army of the Cumberland everything, and almost denied the Army of the Tennessee 
any use of the railroads. I sustained you, and put all army and corps commanders on an 
equal footing, making their orders and requisitions of equal force on the depot officers and 
railroad officials in Nashville. Thomas was extremely sensitive on that point, and as you well 
know had much feeling against you personally which he did not conceal. You also went to 
Illinois more than once to make speeches and were so absent after the capture of Atlanta 
at the time we started for Savannah, and did not join us until we had reached Savannah. 

"Now I have never questioned the right or propriety of you and Blair holding fast to 
your constituents by the usual methods ; it was natural and right, but it did trouble me to 
have my corps commanders serving two distinct causes, one military and the other civil or 
political ; and this did influence me when I was forced to make choice of an army com- 
mander to succeed McPherson. This is all I record in my Memoirs ; it was so and I can- 
not amend them. Never in speech, writing, or record, surely not in the Memoirs, do I re- 
call applying to you and Blair, for I always speak of you together, the term of ' political 
general.' If there be such an expression I cannot find it now, nor can I recall its use. The 
only place wherein the word ' politics ' occurs is in the pages which I have referred to, and 
wherein I explain my own motive and reason for nominating Howard over you and Blair 
for the vacant post. My reason may have been bad, nevertheless it was the reason which 
decided me then and as a man of honor I was bound to record it. At this time, 1883, 
Thomas being dead, I cannot say more than is in the text, viz. : that he took strong ground 
against you, and I was naturally strongly influenced by his outspoken opinion. Still I will 
not throw off on him, but state to you frankly that I then believed that the advice I gave 
Mr. Lincoln was the best practicable. General Howard had been with me up to Knoxville 
and had displayed a zeal and ability which then elicited my hearty approbation, and as I 
trusted in a measure to skilful manoeuvres rather than to downright hard-fighting, I recom- 
mended him. My Memoirs were designed to give the impressions of the hour, and not to 
pass judgment on the qualities of men as exemplified in after life. 

" If you will point out to me a page or line where I can better portray your fighting 
qualities, your personal courage, and magnificent example in actual combat, I will be most 
happy to add to or correct the Memoirs, but when I attempt to explain my own motives 
or reasons you surely will be the first man to see that outside influence will fail. 

" My course is run, and for better or worse I cannot amend it, but if ever in your future 



5 o8 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

done well ; but I did not consider him equal to the command of three 
corps. Between him and General Blair there existed a natural rivalry. 
Both were men of great courage and talent, but were politicians by- 
nature and experience, and it may be that for this reason they were 
mistrusted by regular officers like General Schofield, Thomas, and my- 
self. It was all-important that there should exist a perfect understand- 
ing among the army commanders, and at a conference with General 

you want a witness to your intense zeal and patriotism, your heroic personal qualities, you 
may safely call on me as long as I live. I surely have watched with pride and interest your 
career in the United States Senate, and will be your advocate if you aim at higher honors. 
I assert with emphasis that I never styled you or Blair ' political generals ' and if I used 
the word ' politics ' in an offensive sense, it was to explain my own motives for action, and 
not as descriptive. 

' ' Wishing you all honor and happiness on this earth, I am as always your friend, 

"W. T. Sherman." 
"United States Senate, 

"Personal. Washington, D. C, 

" Sunday, February 18, 1883. 
" General W. T. Sherman. 

"My Dear Sir : I have delayed acknowledging your letter of the nth inst. up to this 
time for the reason that I have been so much engaged every moment of time that I could 
not sooner do so ; for your expression of kindly feelings toward me, I tender my grateful 
acknowledgments. 

" I am inclined, however, my dear General, to the opinion that had you fully under- 
stood the situation in which I was placed at the times mentioned by you, that I returned 
North from the army for the purpose of taking part in the political contests then going on, 
that perhaps your criticisms on my (then) course would not have been made. I did not do 
it for the purpose of 'keeping a hold on my people.' I refused a nomination in my own 
State for a very high position for the reason that I would not have anything to do with 
parties while the war should last. In 1863 when I went home to canvass in Illinois, and to 
help in Ohio, General Grant was fully advised, and knows that although I had to make ap- 
plication for leave of absence, I did not do it of my own volition, but at the request of those 
high in authority. So when I left on leave, after the Atlanta campaign, to canvass for Mr. 
Lincoln, I did it at the special and private request of the then President. This I kept to 
myself, and have never made it public, nor do I propose to do so now, but feel that I may 
in confidence say this to you, that you may see what prompted my action in the premises. 
I have borne for this reason whatever I may have suffered by way of criticism, rather than 
turn criticism on the dead. 

" So far as General Thomas having feeling in the matter you mention, I presume he 
entertained the same feeling that seemed to be general, that no one without a military edu- 
cation was to be trusted to command an army ; this I think was the feeling then, and is 
now, and will ever be. I find no fault with it ; this as a rule is probably correct, but the 
experience of the world has occasionally found exceptions to this rule. I certainly never 
gave General Thomas any occasion to have strong feelings against me. I did complain that 
I was not on an equality with him while I commanded between Decatur and Stevenson ; 
that my passes on the roads were not recognized, and I have General Thomas' letter after- 
ward, admitting the fact and apologizing to me for the conduct of his officers in this matter. 



ADDENDA. 



509 



George H. Thomas at the headquarters of General Thomas J. Woods, 
commanding a division in the Fourth Corps, he (Thomas) remonstrated 
warmly against my recommending that General Logan should be 
assigned to the command of the Army of the Tennessee by reason of 
his accidental seniority. We discussed fully the merits and qualities 
of every officer of high rank in the Army, and finally settled on Major- 
General O. O. Howard as the best officer who was present and avail- 
able for the purpose ; on the 24th of July I telegraphed to General 

I at all times co-operated with him cordially and promptly during my stay at Huntsville and 
at all other times subsequent. Certainly I did for him afterward what few men would have 
done. When ordered to Nashville with a view of superseding him, at Louisville, when I 
found the situation of matters I wrote and telegraphed Grant that he, Thomas, was doing 
all he could, and asked to be ordered back to my own command, which was done. This I 
say to show my kind feeling for him and to say that if I ever did anything to cause him to 
complain of me I was not aware of it. 

"One thing, my dear General, that I feel conscious of, and that is, that no man ever 
obeyed your orders more promptly, and but few ever did you more faithful service in carry- 
ing out your plans and military movements than myself. 

"I may have done yourself and myself an injustice by not disclosing to you the cause 
of my returning North at the time I did, but you have my reasons for it. I felt in honor 
that I could rest. 

"This letter is intended only for full explanation, and for yourself only. I do not feel 
aggrieved as you think, but will ever remain your friend. 

"Yours truly, John A. Logan." 

After giving these private letters for publication in the Tribwte, General Sherman con- 
cluded his letter to Mr. Reid in these words : 

"I now with reverence for his memory, admiration for his heroism in battle, and love 
for the man, hereby ratify and confirm every word of his letter of February 18, 1883. 

" I was fully conscious that General Logan felt deeply what he believed at the time a 
great wrong to himself, and that he yet continued with unabated ardor, zeal and strength 
to fight to the end for the cause we both held sacred. For the twenty-one years since the 
war has ended, we have been closely associated in the many army societies which treasure 
the memories of the war, have shared the same banquets and spoken to the same audiences. 
Only recently at San Francisco, Seattle, and Rock Island we were together, each a rival to 
give pleasure and do honor to the other ; and still later within the past month he was at the 
Fifth Avenue Hotel, his rooms next to mine, and not a night passed but we were together 
discussing old or new events. Both of us were men of strong opinions, sometimes of hasty 
expression, yet ever maintaining the friendship which two soldiers should bear to each other. 
Most undoubtedly did I expect him to survive me, and I have always expressed a wish that 
he, the then strongest type of the volunteer soldier alive, might become the President of the 
United States. 

"It is ordered otherwise, but as it is he has left to his family a name and fame which 
could have been little increased had he lived to attain the office for which so many good 
men contend spite of the experience of the past. 

" When the Society of the Army of the Tennessee holds its next meeting in Detroit next 
September, if living, I may have more to say on this subject. 

" Your friend, W.T.Sherman." 



5'o 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



Halleck this preference and it was promptly ratified by the President. 
General Howard's place in command of the Fourth Corps was filled by 
General Stanley, one of his division commanders, on recommendation 
of General Thomas. 

All these promotions happened to fall upon West Pointers, and 
doubtless Logan and Blair had some reason to believe that we intended 
to monopolize the higher honors of the war for the regular officers. I 
remember well my own thoughts and feelings at the time, and feel sure 
that I was not intentionally partial to any class. I wanted to succeed 
in taking Atlanta, and needed commanders who were purely and 
technically soldiers, men who would obey orders and execute them 
promptly and on time ; for I knew that we would have to execute some 
delicate manoeuvres, requiring the utmost skill, nicety, and precision. 
I believed that General Howard would do all these faithfully and well, 
and I think the result has justified my choice. I regarded both Gen- 
erals Logan and Blair as "volunteers," that looked to personal fame 
and glory as auxiliary and secondary to their political ambition, and 
not as professional soldiers. 

— and the attempted justification is helplessly trivial on the 
very face of it. He admits that " General Logan had taken 
command of the Army of the Tennessee by virtue of his 
seniority, and had done well ' " * and in the face of that ad- 

* It may be well at this time and place — especially as General Sherman saw fit to give 
to the public in eager haste, immediately after General Logan's death, some "personal" 
correspondence that had passed between them on this subject, — a correspondence which, as 
a matter of strict justice to both of these illustrious men, has been placed before the reader 
in the preceding pages, — to furnish to the public, for the first time, certain other corre- 
spondence bearing upon this issue. First, then, will be given the following letter from Sher- 
man to Logan, after the latter had moved the Army of the Tennessee from the left of 
Sherman's long army-line, by the rear, to the right — subsequent to the glorious battle of 
Atlanta. It betrays Sherman's uneasy consciousness of his own injustice in displacing 
Logan from the command of that Army and giving it to the West-Pointer, Howard, in the 
following language : 

" Headquarters, Military Division of the Mississippi, 

"In the Field, Near Atlanta. July 27, 1864. 
" Gen'l Jno. A. Logan. 

"Dear Gen'l ; Take a good rest, I know you are worn out with mental and physical 
work. No one could have a higher appreciation of the responsibility that devolved on you 
so unexpectedly and the noble manner in which you met it. I fear you will feel disap- 
pointed at not succeeding permanently to the Command of the Army and Dept. I assure 
you in giving preference to Gen'l Howard I will not fail to give you every credit for having 
done so well. You have command of a good Corps, a command that I would prefer to the 
more complicated one of a Dept. And if you will be patient it will come to you soon enough. 






ADDENDA. 



5" 



mission adds : " but I did not consider him equal to the com- 
mand of three corps " — a most absurd conclusion, when it is 
understood that the Army of the Tennessee comprised ex- 
actly " three corps," and that Logan had not only shown him- 
self " equal to the command " of its " three corps," but had 

Be assured of my entire confidence. After you have rested come down to Gen'l Davis' po- 
sition and then to the new position of your Corps. Assume Command of it and things will 
move along harmoniously and well. If I can do anything to mark my full sense of the hon- 
orable manner in which you acted in the Battle and since, name it to me frankly and I will 
do it. Gen'l Howard and I will go off to the Right to survey the new Field and prepare 
the way for the troops. Yr friend, 

"W. T. Sherman 71/)'. Gen'l." 

Next, it may be interesting to give Hooker's letter to Logan on the subject of Logan's 
displacement, as showing how other Army officers regarded it, and also in contrast with 
Logan's own soldierly submission to his superiors in command. It runs thus : 

"Head-quarters Twentieth Corps, 
"Near Atlanta Ga. Army of the Cumberland. July 27, 1864. 
"Mj. Gen'l Logan 

"Dear General : On receiving news this morning that Mj. Gen'l Howard had been 
assigned to the Command of your Army, I asked to be relieved from duty with this Army 
— it being an insult to my rank and services. Had you retained the Command I could have 
remained on duty without the sacrifice of honor or of principle. As it is God bless and 
protect you. We will meet when this war is over 

' ' Your friend and servant 

"Joseph Hooker. Mj. Gen'l. 
"I am ordered to report to the Adj't Gen'l — the hopper into which all of us have to go 
now-a-days J. H." 

Next, an official letter of Sherman to Halleck, in which the former, three weeks after 
the unjust action had been taken by him, and probably still perturbed in conscience, en- 
deavors in his peculiar way to account to the authorities at Washington, and perhaps, 
through them, to an inquiring public, for his wrong-doing, and still feeling unable to give 
satisfactory reasons for it, proposes to leave his vindication "to the test of time." That 
letter is as follows : 

"Head-quarters, Military Division of the Mississippi. 

"In the Field, Near Atlanta, Ga. August 16th 1864. 
" Major Gen'l Halleck. 

" Chief of Staff, Washington D. C. 
"General. It occurs tome that preliminary to a future report of the history of this 
Campaign I should record certain facts of great personal interest to Officers of this Com- 
mand. 

" Gen'l McPherson was killed by the musketry fire at the beginning of the Battle of 
July 22nd. He had in person selected the ground for his troops constituting the Left Wing 
of the Army ; I being in person with the Centre, Gen'l Schofield. The moment the in- 
formation reached me I sent one of my Staff to announce the fact to Gen'l Jno. A. Logan 



5^2 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



been called to it at a moment of supreme peril, — when Mc- 
Pherson was dead, and his army was fiercely assailed in front, 
flank, and rear — and out of the impending disaster, threatened 
through Sherman's own blundering orders to McPherson, 
plucked, without Sherman's aid, the glorious and bloody vic- 

the Senior Officer present with the Army of the Tennessee with General instructions to 
maintain the ground chosen by McPherson if possible, but if pressed too hard to refuse his 
Left Flank ; but at all events to hold the Railroad and main Decatur Road ; that I did not 
propose to move or gain ground by that Flank, but rather by the Right ; and that I wanted 
the Army of the Tennessee to fight it out unaided. Gen'l Logan admirably conceived my 
Orders and executed them, and if he gave ground on the Left of the 17th Corps it was 
properly done by my orders ; but he held a certain hill by the Right Division of the 17th 
Corps, the only ground on that line, the possession of which by an Enemy would have dam- 
aged us by giving a reverse fire on the remainder of the troops. Gen'l Logan fought that 
Battle out, as required unaided ; save by a small Brigade sent by my orders from Gen'l 
Schofield to the Decatur Road, well to the Rear where it was reported the Enemy's Cav- 
alry had got into the town of Decatur and was approaching directly on the Rear of Logan ; 
but that Brigade was not disturbed, and was replaced that night by a part of the 15th 
Corps next to Schofield, and Schofields Brigade brought back so as to be kept together on 
its own Line. 

" Gen'l Logan managed the Army of the Tennessee well during his Command and 
it may be that an unfair inference might be drawn to his prejudice because he did not 
succeed to the permanent command. I was forced to choose a Commander not only 
for the Army in the Field but of the Department of the Tennessee, covering a vast 
extent of country, with troops well dispersed. It was a delicate and difficult task, and I 
gave preference to Major Gen'l O. O. Howard then in command of the 4th Army Corps in 
the Dep't of the Cumberland. Instead of giving my reasons, I prefer that the wisdom of 
the choice be left to the test of time. The President kindly ratified my choice and I am 
willing to assume the responsibility. I meant no disrespect to any officer, and hereby de- 
clare that Gen'l Logan submitted with the grace and dignity of a Soldier, Gentleman, and 
Patriot, resumed the command of his Corps proper (15th) and enjoys the love and respect 
of his Army and his Commanders. 

" It so happened that on the 28th of July I had again thrown the same Army to the 
Extreme Right, the exposed flank, when the Enemy repeated the same manouvre, striking 
in mass the extreme Corps, deployed in Line and refused as a Flank (the 15th Major Gen'l 
Logan) and he commanded in person. Gen'l Howard and myself being near, and that 
Corps as heretofore reported, repulsed the Rebel Army completely and next day advanced 
and occupied the ground fought over and the Road the Enemy sought to cover. Gen'l 
Howard who had that very day assumed his new command unequivocally gives Gen'l 
Logan all the credit possible and I also beg to add my most unqualified admiration of the 
bravery, skill, and more yet, good sense that influenced him to bear a natural disappoint- 
ment and do his whole duly like a man. If I could bestow on him substantial reward it 
would afford me unalloyed satisfaction, but I do believe in the consciousness of acts done 
from noble impulses and gracefully admitted by his superiors in authority he will be con- 
tented. He already holds the highest known commission in the Army, and it is hard to 
say how we can better manifest our applause. 






ADDENDA. 



513 



tory of Atlanta ! Why is it that Sherman now pretends that 
he " did not consider " Logan " equal to the command of 
three corps," when in his official report of the battle of At- 
lanta, after mentioning McPherson's death, he said : " General 
Logan succeeded him, and commanded this Ar7ny of the Ten- 
nessee through this desperate battle with the same sttccess and 
ability that had characterized him in the command of a corps 

"At the time of Gen'l Howards selection, Major Gen'l Hooker Commanded the 20th 
Army Corps in the Army of the Cumberland, made up for his special accommodation out 
of the old nth and 12th Corps, whereby Major Gen'l Slocum was deprived of his Corps 
Command. Both the Law and Practice are and have been to fill vacancies in the higher 
Army commands by selection. Rank or dates of commission have not controlled, nor am 
I aware that any reflection can be inferred unless the Junior be placed immediately over 
the Senior ; but in this case Gen'l Hookers command was in no manner disturbed. Gen'l 
Howard was not put over him, but in charge of a distinct and seperate Army. No indig- 
nity was offered or intended and I must say that Gen'l Hooker was not justified in retiring. 
At all events had he spoken or written to me I would have made every explanation and 
concession he could have expected, but could not have changed my course, because then as 
now I believed it right and for the good of our Country and cause. As a matter of Justice, 
Gen'l Slocum having been displaced by the consolidation was deemed by Gen'l Thomas, 
as entitled to the vacancy created by Gen'l Hookers voluntary withdrawal and has re- 
ceived it. 

"Official Copy" \ "With great respect 

L. M. Dayton I (Signed) " W. T. Sherman. 

Aide-de-Camp. ) " Major Gen'l CorridgS' 

Lastly, is the following letter from Sherman to Logan, of same date, in which he practi- 
cally half acknowledges the injustice of his conduct toward Logan as having been proved 
by Logan's noble conduct since Sherman had done the wrong : 

"Headquarters Military Division of the Mississippi, 

"In the Field, Aug. 16, 1864. 
"Gen. Logan, I made a letter official to the War Department explanatory of cer- 
tain matter personal to yourself and others, and instructed Dayton to furnish you a copy, 
he says he has done so. I intended to have sent it you with a private note, I think my 
official letter ought to be satisfactory to you, and if so you are at liberty to furnish a copy 
of the part relating to yourself to your friends at home, and you may even publish the part 
named. But keep the original and be careful not to give copy of the part relating to 
Hooker to any person. 

" The War Department has a right to the fullest intelligence but it is not well to pub- 
lish our opinions when controverted as they lead to discussions which cannot do any good. 
But I do think as between you and Hooker no Soldier or Gentleman will hesitate to say, 
that if / did injustice to either or both, you have best vindicated yourself by standing fast. 
You will never lose by s.uch a course and I hope even now you feel so. 

' ' Your friend, 

"W. T. Sherman." 
33 



5I4 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

or a division ? "* Why also did Sherman at his headquar- 
ters on the night of that great battle inform General Logan 

as the latter has told the writer— that Logan had earned, 

and should have, the permanent command of that army ? 

Further on, in his attempted justification, General Sher- 
man says : " I . . . needed commanders . . . who 
would obey orders and execute them promptly and on time ; 
for I knew that we would have to execute some most delicate 
manoeuvres, requiring the utmost skill, nicety, and precision." 
Here is a covert insinuation that Logan was not such a 
" commander " as " would obey orders and execute them 
promptly and on time." Yet there was in all the armies of 
the Republic, West, or East, no one commander more distin- 
guished for obedience to orders at all critical times, and for 
executing them with promptitude and exactness ; and Sher- 
man himself knows it, as Grant knew it, and every other 
general officer under whom Logan served. And especially 
must Sherman have known it at this very time, for less than 
one month had elapsed since Logan, in obedience to Sher- 

* Similar language can be found also in Grant's official report of this battle, only that 
he extended this just encomium so that it covered the whole period "until he was super- 
seded by Major-General Howard on the 27th," five days after. Grant, in his Personal 
Memoirs, vol. ii., pp. 353-354. says: 

" Logan felt very much aggrieved at the transfer of General Howard from that portion 
of the Army of the Potomac which was then with the Western Army, to the command of 
the Army of the Tennessee, with which army General Logan had served from the battle of 
Belmont to the fall of Atlanta— having passed successively through all grades from col- 
onel commanding a regiment to general commanding a brigade, division, and army corps, 
until upon the death of McPherson the command of the entire Army of the Tennessee de- 
volved upon him in the midst of a hotly contested battle. He conceived that he had done 
his full duty as commander in that engagement ; and I can bear testimony from personal 
observation, that he had proved himself fully equal to all the lower positons which he had 
las a soldier. I will not pretend to question the motive which actuated Sherman 
in taking an officer from another army to supersede General Logan. I have no doubt, 
whatever, that he did tins for what he considered would be to the good of the service, 
which was more important than that the personal feelings of any individual should not be 
aggrieved ; though I doubt whether he had an officer with him who could hare filled the 
pi,,,, ■■ Logan would have done. Differences of opinion must exist between the best of 
friends as 1 in war, and of judgment as to men's fitness. The officer who has the 

command how. ver, should be allowed to judge of the fitness of the officers under him, un- 
less he is very manifestly wrong." 



ADDENDA. 5 ! 5 

man's orders, had, in the face of almost certain death, ad- 
vanced with his heroic corps upon the impregnable position 
of the enemy at Little Kenesaw Mountain. This was one of 
Sherman's bloodiest blunders, but Logan never faltered an 
instant in obediently executing his orders, although scarcely 
a regimental commander of his storming column escaped 
wounds or death in that probably most heroic charge of the 
whole war. And this was but one of many instances, unsur- 
passed, if ever equalled, by any West Pointer, of Logan's 
"technical" and "professional" and "prompt" obedience to 
orders. It was the matchless valor of Logan and his men 
that in this case, as in others, alone redeemed the sanguinary 
mistakes of his superior officer ; and this, perhaps, was not, 
and is not, a pleasant thing for Sherman's peculiar memory 
to dwell upon. 

Again, Sherman gives as a further excuse for not recom- 
mending Logan for the permanent command of the Army of 
the Tennessee at that time, when he had so brilliantly earned 
and been thankfully assured of it by himself, that he (Sher- 
man) knew that "we would have to execute some most deli- 
cate manoeuvres, requiring the utmost skill, nicety, and pre- 
cision ; " and the implication is obvious, although he does 
not here say so, that these "delicate manoeuvres requiring 
the utmost skill, nicety, and precision " were to be performed 
by the Army of the Tennessee, and that Logan had not that 
remarkable " skill, nicety, and precision " in the handling of 
so large a body of troops, which was essential to the emer- 
gency. That would undoubtedly be a strong point if it were 
true. But it was not true — and nobody better knows it than 
Sherman himself! We shall see directly if this is not so : 

First, however, it may be well to ascertain more definitely 
what Sherman means by these " delicate manoeuvres " to be 
executed immediately after Logan's victory of Atlanta— and 
whether they were to be executed by the Army of the Ten- 
nessee, or not. Sherman's "interview" with " Gath," a few 



516 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

days after Logan's sad death,* supplies the evidence from 
Sherman's own mouth. In that interview " Gath " records 
Sherman thus : 

" To have succeeded McPherson would have been a 
proud feather in Logan's cap. But," said General Sherman, 
with his tall head looking upon the floor and his fingers at 

* Published in the Cincinnati Enquirer, December 31, 1886, in the following words: 

New York, December 30th. 

It occurred to me that General Sherman had not been reported at length concerning 
the character and services of General Logan, so I sent him my card on Wednesday, and 
when I went upstairs the General said : . 

" I have three-quarters of an hour, and you can have it all." 

Said I : " I want to get an estimate from you about Logan and some few points of in- 
formation." 

" Haven't I said all that ? " said Sherman. " Well, Logan was as brave as Julius Caesar 
and a first-rate natural soldier, but when he came into the army he was extremely raw and 
crude. He was a very different man by the time he died from the Jack Logan who was in- 
troduced to me about Fort Henry. He was such an 

AMBITIOUS AND RESOLUTE FELLOW 

that the old army officers were inclined to think harshly of him, that he wanted to obtain 
a great deal for himself. That was the cause of some friction which he imputed for some 
time after the war to a natural hostility between regulars and volunteers. You see we did 
not know each other at the outbreak of affairs, when the responsibilities were great, and the 
old West Point men naturally looked upon the politicians as having no business to bring 
their peculiar kind of ambition into the service. We may have under-estimated Logan's 
real abilities, but I am speaking about the facts at that time." 

"General, in what did Logan make a figure in command of his regiment, division, or 
corps ? " 

" Why, he looked so splendid on horseback, and would wave his hat and ride down his 
lines creating tremendous enthusiasm among his men. There was hardly anything like it 
in the army. He was a whole-souled fellow, and liked the military occupation. He liked 
glory and personality. I might say that there was a certain selfishness of environment about 
Logan which made him see nothing but that in which he was visible and included. What- 
ever belonged to himself or his career he took in vividly, and did his full part. He was a 
good deal like some of the best division commanders in the Southern Army — a brave, fierce 
fighter, full of the passion of war." 

I observe, General Sherman, that you refer explicitly to the method of disappointing 
Logan when he was the Ranking Officer of the Army of the Tennessee after McPherson's 
death ?" 

"Yes ; and I want to explain that to you. When McPherson was killed our lines were 
seven miles in length, wrapping Atlanta about in front and keeping the enemy from coming 
out. We had three armies there under my command — the Armyof the Cumberland, under 
< '•' neral Thomas ; <>f the Ohio, under General Schofield ; and of the Tennessee, then under 
Logan was the Ranking Corps Commander. You know that I had no 
power V> make the appointment of the Commander-in-Chief of an army. That had to be 



ADDENDA. 5 1 7 

his chin, " see what we had to do down there at Atlanta when 
McPherson was killed. The first thing I had to do was to 
withdraw McPherson s army from the left and transfer it to 
the right. Now, that is one of the most intricate military 

done from Washington City ; it was the President's privilege. Of course, at the instant of 
McPherson' s death, Logan, by seniority of the three corps commanders, 

TOOK THE COMMAND. 

It was very grateful to his feelings and ambition, and he desired and perhaps expected to be 
kept there. It would have made of him a distinguished man at home, and his mind, un- 
like that of the regular army officers, continually reverted to his beloved constituency which 
had sent him to Congress, and where he had recruited the flower of the young men. 

"I can understand," said General Sherman, "just how Logan felt, and it is no more 
than just that other people should understand how I felt. George H. Thomas commanded 
the chief of the three armies I had there with me. The armies were unequal in numbers ; 
Logan's army was in three corps, numbering about eighteen thousand men. Schofield had 
about thirty-two thousand men. Thomas had more than any — fifty thousand men. So 
General Thomas was the most important person for me to consider, having about one-half 
of my whole force, which of course had learned to respect and sympathize with him as an 
old and tried commander. Now, the three corps of the Army of the Tennessee were all 
commanded by civilians — Logan, Frank Blair, jun., and Granville Dodge. These were all 
ambitious men, but Dodge, I concede, less intense in his ambition than the other two, who 
had been all their lives active politicians. The point was how to put Logan at the top 
without making Blair arfd Dodge jealous. You see we were out there in the enemy's 
country, a law unto ourselves, and we had to consider a great many things. It was to me, 
as the Commander-in-Chief, no great question as to who commanded the smallest of my 
armies, compared to the problem of how to beat the enemy. To General Logan, who had 
come to 

A SUPREME PLACE IN HIS CAREER, 

and seemed on the point of commanding a whole army, the matter of his promotion was 
more important. 

"General Thomas came to see me while Logan was in temporary command, and he 
held that position for some little while. He said to me : ' What are you going to do about 
the Army of the Tennessee ? ' ' Well,' said I, ' there is Logan in command. I do not know 
that it exactly suits me, but it will make him terribly mad not to give him the situation 
permanently. What do you think about it?' 'Well,' said Thomas, ' that is what I came 
to see you about. I don't think it is going to do to keep Logan there. He is brave enough 
and a good officer, but if he had an army I am afraid he would edge over on both sides 
and annoy Schofield and me. Even as a corps commander he is given to edging out 
beyond his jurisdiction. You cannot do better,' said Thomas, 'than to put Howard in 
command of that army. He is tractable and we can get along with him.' To this I re- 
plied in general terms : ' Thomas, to put Howard in command will make a rumpus among 
these volunteers, I am afraid. He has but recently come out here from the East, and you 
know the Western men put a good deal of store upon their achievements and natural 
talents. If I take Howard and give him that army it may dampen the enthusiasm of the 
troops. On the other hand, if I give it to Logan, and I can't give it to anybody else, 



5iS 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



movements in the face of the enemy which a general is called 
upon to perforin. It involved tactics during a general move- 
ment, and while the enemy is liable to come out and go at you. 
The movement was to pass the army by defile in the 
rear from left to right. The way to do it was to draw the 

since he is the senior corps commander, there is some doubt about our getting along well 
together here.' 

" Thomas remarked that he was afraid he could not get along with Logan if he had the 
Army of the Tennessee. He liked Logan personally, but it was a matter of temperament. 
' \\ ell, Thomas,' said I, 'we cannot get along here without you. We must continue to- 
gether in harmony to produce results commensurate with our post and our expectations. 
If you are decided in the matter I will telegraph to Washington and suggest Howard.' 
Thomas thought that was 

THE BEST THAT COULD BE DONE." 

Somewhere about this point General Sherman mentioned a General Wood, of the regular 
army, who lived, he said, at present, at or about Dayton, Ohio ; it seems to me that Sher- 
man said that General Wood also had a hand in this or some other deliberation as to the 
new commander of the Army of the Tennessee. Whatever this remark was, General Sher- 
man finished by saying : 

" I sent a message to President Lincoln, saying that, under the circumstances, I thought 
that O. O. Howard would be acceptable to me and my other commanders. Mr. Lincoln 
promptly replied, appointing Howard to the command. 

"Logan went back to his corps, but I suppose that it was a very sore matter with him. 
There was nothing insubordinate or intractable about his conduct after that. It was not 
until the war was over, when it was apparent that he rather nursed a hostility to the regu- 
lar army officers, but even this gave way in time. He was a magnanimous fellow, and as 
experience softened and widened his character he probably learned to put himself in the 
place of others and subdue his indignation." 

"Did Logan never command an army any more, General Sherman?" 

"Oh, yes. He commanded that very Army of the Tennessee from about Savannah to 
the City of Washington, and at the grand procession when we closed out the war he rode at 
the head of that army up Pennsylvania Avenue to the President's stand. I will tell you how 
that was, and it may be interesting to you. Logan was not with us on the great march 
from Atlanta to the sea. After we got to the sea he rejoined us, and took part in the fight- 
ing through South Carolina and North Carolina. But he disappeared after we got to At- 
lanta. It now appears that he had received a letter from President Lincoln, asking him to 
g>) home to Illinois on furlough and help carry the election in 1864. But, you see, I never 
knew that. He did not tell me. He merely went off, and was gone during our march 
fi mi Atlanta to Savannah. 

" I can see myself now that he yielded to the President's request, and it may have been 
a confidential one. Lincoln unquestionably was distressed about his re-election. He was 
afraid that Illinois itself, where, especially in Southern Illinois, there was a great deal of 
Copperheadism, might not vote for him. Logan went there and made a large number 
of speeches, as I understand, and then started at once to come and command his corps, of 
which he was still the commander, though Osterhaus had taken it out of Atlanta, as his 
proxy. He had a first-rate corps; sometimes I have thought it was the best corps in my 



ADDENDA. 



519 



army to be removed out to a place in the rear by detachments 
and then move it compactly in fighting position the whole 
length of the investing army, and transfer it to the right so that 
it will come into position in fighting order again, tactically 
moving with reference to both the army and the transfer." 

army. The material of it was good, and his example as a personal commander had been 
very useful to it. 

"When Logan got to City Point, on the James River, it seems that General Grant had 
become anxious about General Thomas in Tennessee. Thomas had been detached from 
my army, and sent back to head off Hood, who had broken into Tennessee. A good many 
of the officers thought that Thomas 

OUGHT TO HAVE FOUGHT HOOD 

Without letting him go far into Tennessee. Hood had left Atlanta, and it was a good way 
back to the Tennessee line. The idea was that that country which we had redeemed ought 
not to be trespassed upon again by an army of the enemy without giving him fight. Logan 
now had another opportunity to command an army and win a victory, and his conduct at 
this time will meet the approbation of everybody. Grant had given him discretion whether 
to take command or not, it seems. Logan reached Louisville and found that General 
Thomas was in front of Nashville waiting for the sleet to thaw off. Logan, however, was 
assured that Thomas had his army in splendid condition and would win a victory. He 
therefore kept the order in his pocket and allowed Thomas to go on and crown his fame 
with that fine performance at Nashville. You may remember that when Thomas fell back 
to Nashville he threw Schofield out in front of him, and broke the enemy as he was 
coming forward, and then quietly waited and went out of his works for him and destroyed 
him." 

"General Sherman, were Thomas and Logan at that time, or any other, unfriendly?" 

" Not at all. They liked each other. Thomas' condition about Logan commanding 
the Army of the Tennessee had no feeling in it ; it was merely forethought. Logan liked 
him. He appreciated Logan, too." 

"General, have you any regrets at the present time about appointing Howard, instead 
of Logan ? " 

"As to that," said the General, " the result seems to me to justify what we did at that 
time. There was no trouble with Howard. Our march to the sea and to the conclusion of 
the war went on without a break. Now, that was what we were employed for and expected 
to do. Of course, personal injustice and discrimination appear constantly during warfare, 
as one person is disappointed and another given an opportunity. I cannot say, even while 
Logan lies dead, that I did not do the best I could, in view of my situation and that of the 
country. It turned out well. Perhaps if I had put Logan in command of that army it 
would have turned out equally well. It hardly could have turned out any better." 

LOGAN AND M'PHERSON. 

" Did Logan get along well with McPherson ? His superior in his own army ? " 
" First-rate. McPherson was a remarkable man. He could get out of men their best 
services without being aggressive. Everybody who came in contact with him had to con- 
cede almost at once to his military skill and knowledge. He was one of the best soldiers 
we ever had in this country. Educated at the military academy, fond of the profession of 



5 2 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

Just so. And it was this particular one " of the most in^ 
tricate " of all " military movements in the face of the enemy," 
requiring the " utmost skill" nicety, and precision, which 
Sherman insinuates in his " Memoirs," Logan was not equal 
to! 

If Sherman really thought Logan unequal to this su- 
premely difficult and delicate task, how is it that on the 

arms, quick to discern, substantial in judgment, he was a man you never had to tell any 
thing twice. Having come out of the West and from plain life, he had no trouble under- 
standing a man like Logan, and Logan was probably more of a student of war from Mc- 
Pherson than from any other person. To have succeeded McPherson would have been a 
proud feather in Logan's cap. But," said General Sherman, with his tall head looking 
upon the floor and his fingers at his chin, " see what we had to do down there at Atlanta 
when McPherson was killed. The first thing I had to do was to withdraw McPherson's 
army from the left and transfer it to the right. Now, that is one of the most intricate mili- 
tary movements in the face of the enemy which a general is called upon to perform. It in- 
volved tactics during a general movement, and while the enemy is liable to come out and 
go at you. 

"At West Point they teach tactics in the midst of strategy, if they teach anything. 
They do get it right into the systems of the boys there. You cannot stop in the enemy's 
face to show how these tactics are to be exercised on the field. That was one of the things 
I thought about when the question of McPherson's successor came up. The movement was 
to pass the army by defile in the rear from left to right. 

THE WAY TO DO IT 

was to draw the army to be removed out to a place in the rear by detachments and then 
move it compactly in fighting position the whole length of the investing army, and transfer 
it to the right so that it will come into position in fighting order again, tactically moving with 
reference to both the army and the transfer." 

"What was the occasion for transferring McPherson's army in that way?" 
"Why, you see, the death of McPherson was caused by the enemy coming out of his 
works and encountering a movement of ours to manoeuvre him out. Each side was to a de- 
gree surprised. The Confederates had defended Atlanta in a very elaborate way. They had 
high ramparts, ditches, salients, plenty of abatis, fraises, and whatever would make their 
sixty thousand men inside of these works equal to my one hundred thousand men on the 
outside. Besides, they were a brave garrison. My business was to see how I could trick 
them to give up those defences and fight me on the outside. As soon as McPherson was 
dead my mind came to that problem : ' How am I going to get them out and neutralize their 
advantages ? ' That involved a shifting about of the army in order to make them uneasy. 
It was one of the tilings which determined me to put a trained officer in command of the 
army I meant to transfer." 

"Yel you have no complaint to make of Logan as a corps commander?" 
"None whatever. As I have said before, Logan could see everything in his own en- 
vironment and sight first-rate. He could look undaunted at the enemy in front and com- 
mand his corps gallantly and in a way to inspirit them. With me the problem was always 



ADDENDA. 521 

evening of July 25th — three days after the desperate battle 
of Atlanta — he actually ordered him to perform it ? * And 
what sort of a memory, or a conscience, can be boasted by 
the author of Sherman's " Memoirs " to make such an insinua- 

What next? How am I going to accomplish that which will anticipate some other delay or 
dilemma ? '' 

"General, if Logan had been sent to West Point when a young lad, would he not, with 
his spirit, have probably made a great soldier ? " 

" I think he would. He was a first-rate soldier as it was. There was 

NO BETTER VOLUNTEER. 

Of the volunteer commanders, while many were capable, only a few rose to the command 
of large bodies of men, without early military training. You have suggested Sickles ; yes, 
he got into large responsibility. There was Terry also. Then Logan and Frank Blair come 
next to mind. I suppose those four are about the widest representatives of the promotion 
of the volunteer. West Point addresses itself to taking out of the man his insubordination, 
his mere individuality ; it teaches him obedience in everything, so that in his place in the 
army he will be unquestioning and execute what is told him. There can only be one will at 
the actual seat of war. It must be a will which is distributed down through the grades of 
commanders until it reaches the soldiers themselves. Of course, it is much in a man's fa- 
vor that he has originally resolution of character, natural courage. Therefore, I say that if 
Logan had gone to West Point he might have made a remarkable soldier. But he was re- 
markable as it was." Gath. 

* Sherman's order to Logan to perform this difficult task with the Army of the Tennes- 
see, is in these words : 

Special Field Orders ) Headquarters Military Division of the Mississippi, 

No. 42. \ In the Field, near Atlanta, Ga., July 25, 1864. 

IV. . . Major General Logan will tomorrow send all his trains and sick and impedi- 
ments to the rear of General Thomas, to any point near the mouth of Peach Tree Creek, 
and during the early morning, by moonlight, of the next day, viz. : Wednesday, July 27th, 
withdraw his army, corps by corps, and move it to the right, forming on General Palmer, 
and advancing the right as much as possible. 

By order of Major General W. T. Sherman : 

L. M. Dayton, 

A ide-de- Camp. 

From Logan's orders to the corps commanders of his Army of the Tennessee, he had 
evidently anticipated this order, as the following copy — addressed to one of them — will 
show : 

Headquarters, Department and Army of the 
Special Field Orders 1 Tennessee, 

°* 77- Before Atlanta, Ga., July 24th, 1864. 

II. Corps Commanders will direct their Trains to move at once, and park in rear of 
Maj. Gen'l Howard's command, on and in the vicinity of Clear Creek. 



5 2 2 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

tion when he knows, and knew while writing them, that he 
not only ordered Logan to make that exact movement with 
the Army of the Tennessee — from the left, by the rear of the 



Ammunition trains and Ambulances will be kept in the immediate rear of their respective 
Divisions. 

The positions occupied by the Trains of the respective corps will be reported to these 
Hd. Qrs. 

By order of Major General John A. Logan. 

Wm. T. Clark, 

Assistant- Adjutant General. 
Maj. Gen'l G. M. Dodge, 

Com'd'g L. W. 1 6th A. C. 

And Logan's orders to all his corps-commanders for the entire movement of the Army 
of the Tennessee, based upon Sherman's brief order "No. 42, "were promptly issued in the 
following shape — this also being the copy sent to Dodge : 

Headquarters, Department and Army of the 
Special Field Orders J Tennessee, 

No - 79- Before Atlanta, Ga., July 26th, 1864. 

IV. In order to carry out the instructions contained in Special Field Order No. 42, 
Mil. Div. Miss., the following movements of this Army will be made : 

1st. Brig. Gen'l Wood, com'd'g 1st Div. 15th Army Corps, will, at 4 o'c. this p.m., march 
with his command, and take up his position in the new line of intrenchments, his Right 
resting near the Railroad. 

2nd. Maj. Gen'l Dodge, com'd'g L. W. 16th A. C, will at 12 o'c. tonight, draw out 
his command, and move by the nearest route to the Main Road, running in rear of Gen'l 
Schofield's Line, entering the road immediately to the West of the point where the new line 
of intrenchments crosses the Railroad. Gen'l Dodge will move to the Right of Gen'l 
Thomas' command, and take up his position on the right of the corps of Gen'l Palmer. 

3rd. As soon as the troops of Maj. Gen'l Dodge have filed out, Maj. Gen'l Blair will 
draw out his command, and march by the most practicable routes to the Main Road indi- 
cated above, following the 16th Corps on that Road, and taking up a position on the Right. 

4th. When the troops of 17th Corps have filed past, Brig. -Gen'l Morgan L. Smith, 
com'd'g 15th A. C, will draw out his command, following the 17th Corps, and moving last 
the Division of Brig. -Gen'l Wood. The 15th Corps will take up a position on the Right of 
the 17th Corps, one Division of the command being held in reserve. The new line to be 
occupied on the Right will be thrown forward as far as practicable. 

5th. That portion of the artillery which can be drawn out during the day, will be des- 
ignated by Capt. Ilickenloper, Chief of Artillery, and a position assigned it in the new line. 
The remaining Artillery will be drawn out immediately after dark, the wheels muffled with 
grain sacks, and every precaution used to make the movement as silently as possible. 

6th. All the trains except one wagon, with ammunition for each Regiment and Battery, 
will be sent to-day to a point in rear of the centre of the Army, and there parked. 

7th. Corps commanders will, under the direction of Capt. Reese, Chief Engineer, cause 
I to be constructed during the day for their commands to move out upon, and 
Staff-officers will make themselves thoroughly acquainted with the route to be taken by each 
Division. 



ADDENDA. 523 

other two armies, to their right — but that Logan actually per- 
formed it with wonderful skill and success ! * 

And what was Logan's reward for the great victory he 
had won, and this equally remarkable military movement he 
had subsequently made with the Army of the Tennessee ? 
Displacement from the high command which had fallen to 
him by seniority, and which, by his wonderful achievements 
in the interim, he had proved his eminent fitness to hold ! 

To his dying day, General Sherman will never be able to 
excuse himself before the Nation for his injustice to the Lion 
of Atlanta, nor can it ever be condoned until he can reach 
those heights of courage, to which so few have ever as- 
cended, by acknowledging, with the magnanimity possessed 
only by really great men, his own error of judgment. 

West Point — which means the perhaps very natural de- 
sire of every West Pointer to help in advancing other West 
Pointers at the expense of all other persons — was mainly at 
the bottom of Sherman's unjust action in this matter. Had 
Julius Caesar himself been in Logan's place — and Sherman 
has, since Logan's death declared that " Logan was as brave 
as Julius Caesar, and a first-rate natural soldier" — Sherman 
would have put Howard in Julius Caesar's place, because 
Howard was a West Pointer and Julius Caesar was not. 

What had Howard done that entitled him to supersede 
Logan ? Had he done more than anyone else to win Bel- 
mont ? Had he won his brigadier's star at, and written his 
name in blood high up on the glorious roll of Donelson ? 
Had he distinguished himself at the siege of Corinth? Had 



8th. All arrangements to accomplish these movements will be made during the day, so 

that the troops can be drawn out with celerity and without confusion. 

By order of Mai.-Gen'l John A. Logan. 

Wm. T. Clark, 

Asst. A djt.- General. 
Maj.-Gen'l G. M. Dodge, 

Com'd'g L. W. 16th A. C. 
* For some better idea of this remarkable piece of generalship on Logan's part, see 
pages 70-71. 



C2 4 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

/^achieved a Major-Generalship for services through the first 
Mississippi campaign ? Had his men conceived and suc- 
cessfully carried out the running of the guns of Vicksburg, 
which gave success to Grant's remarkable feat of cutting 
loose from his base, and all that followed ? * Had he ever 
fought and won such a battle as Raymond Hill ? Had he 
ever figured with such distinction as did Logan at such a 
battle as Champion Hills ? Had he ever shown such skill 
and valor as had Logan at Vicksburg ? Had he ever taken 
command of an entire army of three corps under such cir- 
cumstances as did Logan, and made such a brilliant record 
with it as Logan had done ? Had he ever commanded such 
an army at all ? No. All we hear of him from Sherman is 
that Howard had " served" with him " at Missionary Ridge 
and Knoxville," and that he was — a West Pointer. 

Sherman, however, declares that this was not the reason 
for his act of injustice to Logan. What else could it be ? 
Sherman contents himself with various palpably insufficient 
excuses for his conduct. He will not tell. But Logan al- 
ways imputed it to West Point favoritism and prejudice — 
which Sherman denies. As the case now stands, it looks as 
though there were some other secret reason which Sherman 
dare not avow lest his own reputation might suffer in the 
avowal. However that may be, until Sherman, or some 
other person having knowledge of that suppressed reason, 
does avow it, the public will settle down to the conviction 
that Sherman's inexcusable act of injustice to Logan was due 
not alone to West Point favoritism and West Point preju- 
dice, but to West Point jealousy as well. 



ADDENDA. 525 

LOGAN "THRICE" REFUSES "THE CROWN," IN l88o — HIS WON- 
DERFUL FORTITUDE UNDER A REVERSE — SEVERAL BITS OF 
HITHERTO UNWRITTEN HISTORY. 

A Chicago " special " to the New York Tribune, Janu- 
ary 19, 1887, tells the following story, which is, in its main 
features, substantially correct :* 

The statement is made here, and vouched for as authentic, that 
John A. Logan " refused the crown " at the national convention held in 
Chicago in 1880, before Garfield was nominated. Weary with working 
for Grant, and worn out with excitement, Logan lay down in his room 
in the Palmer House during the recess on the last day of the conven- 
tion, to rest and recuperate for the renewal of the struggle in the after- 
noon. There was a knock on the door. Mrs. Logan answered it. 
Senators Frye and Hale stood outside. They requested an interview 
with Logan. They were admitted and without unnecessary words an- 
nounced their mission, stating that Mr. Blaine could not be nominated, 
and that they had come to offer their support to Logan, winding up 
their remarks by asserting that he could be nominated immediately 
after the recess. 

"Logan said: ' Gentlemen, you are extremely kind, but I cannot 

* In his eulogy of Senator Logan, on the floor of the United States Senate, February 9, 
1887, Senator Frye said : 

" I have seen within a few days an item floating in the press that in that ever to be re- 
membered convention, where it was apparent that Mr. Blaine could not be nominated, 
Senators Hale and Frye visited General Logan and tendered to him the support of their 
friends for the nomination if he would accept the candidacy. Of course it was a myth. 
Senators Hale and Frye both knew John A. Logan, and had known him for years, and 
even if they had been vested with the authority, which they were not, they never would 
have dreamed of undertaking to bribe him from his allegiance. They knew that no gratifi- 
cation of personal ambition (and it is the greatest temptation to a man on earth) would 
move him from his allegiance to Grant in that fight any more than a summer breeze would 
stir a mountain from its base." 

Senator Frye' s denial of the "item" — so far as himself and Senator Hale were con- 
cerned — is given as a matter of fairness to both senators, but the fact still remains that the 
proffer was made, and presumably by those having authority to do so. General Logan 
himself told the writer of it. "I could have had the nomination myself," he said, " instead 
of Garfield, if I would have taken it. It was offered me." Before Senator Frye's denial, 
the writer was also assured, from an authoritative source, that not only was the proffer made, 
but that it was made by Messrs. Hale and Frye. Since that denial the assurance has been 
repeated. 



526 LIFE OF IOGAN. 

accept your proposal. I have been for Gen. Grant, I am for him now, 
and he will always have one vote from Illinois in that convention so 
lung as I am in it and his name is before it. Grant's name cannot be 
withdrawn with my consent and he will be voted for to the last.' 
" Messrs. Hale and Frye, finding him inflexible, left him." 

A few words more will suffice to complete the record of 
this incident, which is given as a practical illustration of Lo- 
gan's lofty spirit of self-sacrifice, unwavering loyalty to his 
friends, and power of resisting temptation even when pre- 
sented in its most alluring form to an American patriot. 

It was the day before Garfield's nomination, while Wash- 
burne and others were outside, negotiating and trying to 
make, in the manner common to politicians, some "arrange- 
ment " which would break the " deadlock," and defeat Grant, 
that Logan was first approached, while on the floor of the 
convention, with the proposition above alluded to. He in- 
stantly and positively refused to listen to it, declaring that he 
was "for Grant, first, last, and all the time " — or words to 
that effect, and, at once resumed the gallant fight for Grant, 
which he and Conkling and Cameron were leading ; and the 
writer has heard, from those who were present, that there 
was no grander figure in all that great National convention 
than that of General Logan, when, mounted on a chair, with 
the banner of Illinois waving in his strong hands, his eyes 
flashing with fierce energy, his clarion voice rang out clear 
and distinct throughout that vast hall, so that all the assem- 
bled multitude could hear, the battle-cry of the " stalwart " 
Grant column — the inflexible "306." 

After the adjournment that day, — which had been carried 
by the anti-Grant men for the purpose of making a " combina- 
tion " upon some other man in order to beat Grant, Logan was 
resting at the Palmer House, when Blaine's most conspicu- 
ous friends and managers, to wit: Messrs. Hale, Frye, Jer- 
ome B. Chaffee, Stephen B. Elkins, William H. Chandler, 
and others, visited Logan and again laid before him the 



ADDENDA. 



527 



tempting proposal mentioned, — Mrs. Logan and Levi P. 
Morton being in the rooms at the time, — which he again re- 
fused to entertain for a moment. 

The final result was that, after being engaged in anxious 
and heated discussion and banraininof most of the niidit, the 
anti-Grant men, by three or four o'clock in the morning 
reached an agreement. The " combination " had fixed upon 
Garfield in order to beat Grant. 

What followed on the floor of the convention that morn- 
ing — so far as the nomination of Garfield is concerned — 
is known of all men ; but it remained to the Boston Ad- 
vertiser, soon after the General's death, to tell " How Lo- 
gan bore defeat."* He seemed more like victor, than van- 
quished. 

As a part of the hitherto " unwritten history " of this 
famous convention, it may be interesting to mention that, 
after consummating the bargain they had made, by nominat- 
ing Garfield, the anti-Grant men became frightened over 
their " victory ! " They determined, therefore, to put some 

* It said : General Logan had the quality of fortitude, or what is sometimes called nerve, 
in an extraordinary degree. This was shown conspicuously in the National Republican Con- 
vention of 1880. He and Mr. Conkling and the Hon. Don Cameron were the leading sup- 
porters of General Grant in the great contest there waged. When their hopes were destroyed 
by the nomination of General Garfield, Mr. Conkling and Mr. Cameron appeared "all 
broken up." It was Mr. Conkling' s duty to make the motion to make the nomination 
unanimous. The convention waited for him, while he remained a long time as if glued to 
his chair, his face buried in his hands resting on the chair in front of him. Nobody dis- 
turbed him until he recovered sufficient command of himself to move out into the aisle to 
make the expected motion. He seemed like another and different man from the one who 
had led so bravely the Grant forces. His hair was dishevelled, his face was woful, a white 
handkerchief was tied loosely about his neck, his voice was low and quavering, and his 
speech was plainly a perfunctory courtesy uttered with difficulty. 

General Logan seconded the motion. Doubtless he was as much disappointed as Mr. 
Conkling but he promptly mounted a chair, stood for a moment magnificently erect and 
calm, as if he were the spokesman of the satisfied victors instead of the defeated, and when 
he spoke his voice rang out clear and strong, without a suggestion of weakness. He 
never appeared in the Senate or on the battlefield more completely master of his emotions. 
The convention regarded him with universal admiration. There was not a suspicion of 
weakness, or even of disappointment, in attitude, manner or speech. It was an exhibition 
of imperturbable fortitude that under the circumstances was simply heroic. 



523 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



Grant man upon the Presidential ticket with Garfield. Their 
spokesman came to Logan and begged him to allow them to 
nominate him for Vice-Presidency. Logan indignantly re- 
fused, adding to his refusal substantially these words : "If you 
do not at once nominate, for the second place on the ticket, a 
New York man, I will myself put Oglesby in nomination." 
Accordingly, Chester Allan Arthur of New York was nom- 
inated for the Vice-Presidency. 

Thus it will be seen that Fate ordained that Logan should 
" thrice refuse the crown " at this National convention : — ■ 
once on the floor of the convention, once again at the Palmer 
House, and once more when he declined that Vice-Presiden- 
tial nomination which would have brought to him, as it did 

to Arthur, the succession to the 
Presidency after Garfield's sad death ! 

logan's last Christmas souvenir — 

A POEM. 

It may not be without interest to 
the reader to recall, for the purpose 
of completing, the story of the Christ- 
mas Eve' incident already briefly 
touched upon in these pages. It was 
the day before Christmas, 1886, that 
the writer, having, as was customary 
with him at Christmas-tide, procured 
a little souvenir of the holy season — 
which, on this occasion, was a card, somewhat larger than 
this page, bearing upon its face wreath-like sprays of grass, 
flowers, and shells from the Holy Land, partly encircling 
the inscription " God guard you and God guide you," — for 
presentation to General Logan, sat down in his own parlor 
and wrote the following lines * to accompany it : 




VGTwdWiu- 



* Inserted in this volume at the personal request of Mrs. Logan. 



ADDENDA. 529 

TO GENERAL JOHN A. LOGAN, XMAS EVE, 1886. 

{With a card of grasses, flowers, and shells from the Holy Land, inscribed 
" God guard you and God guide you."] 

As on your couch of suffering you lie 

And feebly turn — while dreadful spasms of pain 

Dart through your every limb — to look on this 

Reminder of the Holy Christmas-tide, 

I hear you in my fancy, faintly say : 

" What are they ? Mere dead grasses, flowers, and shells ! " 

And I, though absent, fain would answer you, 

That each of these, though dead, is living yet ; 

And though you see in them no moving tongues, 

Yet each and every one of them can tell 

A tale miraculous and wonderful, 

Which, opening nineteen centuries ago, 

Has shed a glory on the Ages past, 

And, vitalizing Ages yet to come, 

Shall wax resplendent to the very end ! 

They come from Palestine ! 

Those pimpernels, 
Scarlet and white, violet and olive-green— 
Symbolic colors in The Church's rites, 
Grew in the very air the Christ-child breathed ! 
That shell, perchance, is one that closely roofed 
The home of some old mollusk, on the beach, 
When Christ, the Lord, stood by the raging sea— 
The sea of Galilee— and stilled the storm ! 
That spray of grass, or this, may chance have grown 
From the same stock as that which proudly felt 
At Olivet, or elsewhere, thereabout, 
The pressure of the sacred feet of God ! 
Those modest flowers— how beautiful are they ! — 
Boast for their ancestors, the very ones 
Our blessed Lord forever sanctified, 
When, touching on King Solomon's grand state 
As having less of glory than had these, 
He taught us that the humblest of God's works 
Are greater than the greatest of mankind's. 
Aye, all of these dead grasses, flowers, and shells, 
Gathered, with care, in that far Holy Land, 
Had birth and death, where Christ was born and died ; 
35 



53 o LIFE OF LOGAN. 

Some, from the modest fields of Bethany ; 
Some, from the beaten paths near Bethlehem ; 
Some, from the sacred banks of Jordan's stream ; 
Some, from the hillsides, near Jerusalem ; 
All, from some spot made holy by the feet 
And trailing garments of the Son of God, — 
All from the soil once watered by His tears ! 

" What are they ! — these dead flowers, grasses, and shells ? " 
Reminders, teachers, showing all of us 
That even dead things may teach living truths. 

Sick soldier, lying on thy bed of pain, 
What are thy ills, to His who died for thee ? 
Thy agonies are great, and bravely borne ; 
O, may they also be borne thankfully ; 
For sufferings bring thee nearer to thy God — 
And make thee dearer to His loving heart, — 
Who, through His Holy Angels, guards thy couch, 
An', if thou wilt, shalt guide thy future paths. G. F. D. 

On second thoughts, however, the writer, fearing that 
the reading of these lines to the General might have a de- 
pressing effect upon him, concluded to suppress them — at 
least for awhile. Proceeding to Calumet Place in the even- 
ing he found the General suffering less acute pain. It had 
left his right arm and, Mrs. Logan — who was the only other 
person then present at the bedside — said, had gone to the 
left side, now useless. She held the open box containing the 
card before the General's eyes as the writer clasped his hand. 
The General looked his thanks, uttered a few words, and 
seemed to fall into a half-conscious doze. It was 5.30 p.m., 
when, as before mentioned, upon rising to leave him, the 
General twice pressed the writer's hand warmly, while the 
latter said : " General, it would be a mockery to wish you a 
merry Christmas, but I do wish you a quiet and peaceful 
one ; " and when the General replied slowly, and as if well 
weighing the words, " No ; not a merry Christmas, but I 
hope a quiet and peaceful one." Those were the last words 
the writer ever heard from the lips of Logan. 



ADDENDA. 



531 



LOGAN S BRAVE SCOTTISH ANCESTRY — MEANING OF THE NAME 

— ROBERT, THE BRUCE's, VOW SIR JAMES DOUGLAS AND 

THE BRUCE'S HEART — HEROIC CHARGE AGAINST THE SARA- 
CENS IN SPAIN VALOR OF SIR ROBERT AND SIR WALTER 

LOGAN — ESTATES FORFEITED, AND THE NAME PROSCRIBED 

THE LOGAN ARMORIAL BEARINGS. 

From Vol. II. of " ' Costumes of the Clans,' by R. R. 
Mclvan, Esq., with accompanying description and historical 
memoranda of character, mode of life, etc., by James Logan, 
Esq., F.S.A., Sc. Cor. Mem. Soc. Ant., Normandy, etc.," 
which contains much other information touching- the Clan- 
Logan and its chiefs, the following extracts have been taken, 
bearing upon the meaning of the name, and characteristics of 
the remote ancestry of General Logan. They doubtless will 
prove interesting to all who read them, especially in view 
of the fact that the General was directly descended from the 
valiant crusader, Sir Robert Logan of Restalrig, (or Lastal- 
rig,) whose chivalric and romantic death is here recounted, 
and was entitled to the armorial bearings described : 

" Siol Loganich — The Logans. It is accounted most honorable to be 
distinguished by a local appellation, as it is an indication that the prop- 
erty from which it is derived was in possession of the founder of the 
tribe or family. Logan and Lagan signify a low-lying or flat tract of 
country, and these terms occur in various parts of Scotland, in some 
cases giving name to a parish, as Logan in Ayr, and Laggan in Inver- 
ness-shire. 

" When an individual receives a crown-charter, it is evident that he 
must have been a person of some consideration. It is not, however, to 
be supposed that he was the first who bore the appropriate name, al- 
though, in this manner, the erudite Chalmers, in his elaborate ' Cale- 
donia,' derives the most distinguished families in Scotland. 

" Guillim, the celebrated writer on English heraldry, gives this ac- 
count of the origin of the name : 'A certain John Logan, serving with 
the English forces in Ireland, whom the historian Balfour calls one of 
the lords of that country, having, upon the defeat of the army which had 
invaded the island under the command of Edward Bruce in 13 16, taken 
prisoner Sir Allan Stewart, that nobleman gave his daughter, with sev- 



532 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



eral lands, to li is conqueror's son, and from this union, our genealogist 
says, came the Logans of Scotland, who were then represented by those 
of Idbury in Oxfordshire ! ' Unfortunately for the accuracy of this deri- 
vation, we find various individuals of the name, in Scotland, witnessing 
royal grants, and giving charters themselves, one hundred and fifty years 
before this period. In the former capacity Robertus de Logan appears 
frequently in the time of William the Lyon, who reigned from 1165 to 
1 214. As a Gaelic cognomen, Logan was found equally in Ireland, 
. . . and there seems good reason to believe that these were emi- 
grants from Scotland. 

" The signatures of Walter, Andrew, Thurbrand, John, and Phillip 
de Logan are found among those attached to the celebrated " Ragman's 
Roll," a bond of fealty exacted by Edward I. of England, in 1296. The 
Scottish chiefs, whom that crafty monarch suspected of being too much 
imbued with the principles of liberty to be safely trusted at home, he 
compelled to serve during his wars in Guienne, and John Cumin, Lord 
of Badenach, and Allan Logan, a knight ' manu et consilio promptumj 
were thus disposed of. 

" In 1306, Dominus Walterus Logan, with many others, having been 
tal^en prisoner, was hanged at Durham, in presence of Edward of Car- 
narvon, the king's son. 

" In 1329, a remarkable occurrence took place in Scottish history. 
Robert the Bruce had made a vow of pilgrimage to the city of Jeru- 
salem ; but the continued wars, and unsettled state of the kingdom, 
rendered it impossible for him to carry his long-cherished intention into 
effect, and, on finding death approach, he willed that the heart which 
had so long panted to view the scene of his Saviour's sufferings should 
be taken there, and deposited in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. 

"For this purpose, preparations were made on a scale very magnifi- 
cent for the age, and a choice band of the most chivalrous Scottish no- 
bility was selected as a becoming escort for the princely relic. To 'the 
good Sir James Douglas ' was assigned the command, and Sir Robert and 
Sir Walter Logan are particularly noticed as being among the most dis- 
tinguished of his companions in the pious embassy, which was unhaply 
fated to abortion. Passing by Spain, the gallant Scotsmen learned that 
the Saracens had devastated that country, and were then employed in 
the siege of Grenada ; when it was at once resolved, that as the Moors 
were bitter enemies of the Cross, the duty of the expedition was to land 
and fight against them. In the heat of the attack that speedily followed 
the debarkation, Douglas, taking from his breast the silver casket which 
contained the precious charge, threw it into the thickest rank of the foe, 
exclaiming : ' There, go thou valiant heart as thou were wont to lead us ! ' 



ADDENDA. 



533 



— when the heroic troop dashed after it with a fury irresistible. The 
casket was regained, but in attempting the rescue of their friend, Lord 
Sinclair, both Sir Robert and Sir Walter Logan were slain. 

" The Logans of Lastalrig were chiefs of the name in the south of 
Scotland, and this property, with other lands near Berwick, they held 
prior to the thirteenth century. ... 

" The preceptory of Saint Anthony, the picturesque ruins of which 
are to be seen on a small level in the precipitous ascent of Arthur's 
Seat, beside Edinburgh, was founded, in 1430, by Sir Robert Logan of 
Lastalrig, and it was the only establishment of this order in Scotland. 
The collegiate church of Lastalrig, a fine Gothic structure, restored and 
made the parish kirk at South Leith, is mentioned as early as n 70. If 
it was not founded by the Logans, whose castle was close adjoining, 
they were great benefactors thereto, and were patrons of the valuable 
living. 

" The Lairds of Lastalrig, which has been generally spelt Restalrig, 
although always pronounced Lasterrick, were barons of considerable 
note, most of them having received knighthood for national services. 
Some of them, also, were sheriffs of the county, and others held the 
dignity of Lord Provost of Edinburgh. Sir Robert Logan of Lastalrig 
married a daughter of King Robert II., by his wife Euphemia Ross ; 
and a successor, of the same name, was one of the hostages given for the 
ransom of James I. 

" Leith is the flourishing sea-port of the Scottish metropolis. The 
land on which it is built, and the harbor itself, belonged to the Lairds 
of Lastalrig, and, in 1398, Sir Robert Logan granted a charter, confer- 
ring on the city of Edinburgh free liberty and license for ' augmenting, 
enlarging, and bigging, the Harbour of Leith.' . . . In 1413, he gave 
an additional grant of land, on which to build a free quay, and both of 
these charters were afterward ratified and extended by the crown." 

The historian proceeds, at some length, to state substantially that, 
owing to the close proximity of the Logan estates to Edinburgh, and 
the jealousies occasioned thereby, the corporation of that city and the 
barons of Lastalrig were on bad terms ; and "finally, that mysterious 
affair, the Govvrie conspiracy, ' afforded an opportune occasion for the 
citizens to get rid of their superiors, and the crafty James VI. to 
gratify his own revenge for the raid of Ruthven, and reward his grasp- 
ing favourites with the forfeited estates.' A series of letters addressed 
to the Earl of Gowrie were produced, alleged to have been ' written 
everie word and subscribed by' him (Logan of Lastalrig), in which he 
is implicated as a zealous partisan in the alleged treasonable plot. 



5 34 LIFE 0F LOGAN. 

" Logan had been dead nine years, but, as by the Scottish law a 
traitor was required to be present at his own trial, the mouldering re- 
mains were exhumed and produced in court ! . . . The Lords of 
the Articles were, (notwithstanding the suborned evidence of an infa- 
mous witness), prepared to bring in a verdict of acquittal, but the Earl of 
Dunbar, who got most of the Logan's estates, 'travailed so earnestly to 
overcome their hard opinions of the process,' that they at last ac- 
knowledged themselves convinced ! The forfeiture was accompanied 
by proscription, so that it was illegal for anyone to bear the name of 
Logan. 

"The Logans of Lastalrig had ample lands, either in their own 
possession or as superiors, in the counties of Ayr, Renfrew, Perth, 
Lanark, Aberdeen ; and even so far north as Moray, where they held 
the barony of Abernethie, in Strathspey. 

" The armorial bearings are allusive to the expedition with The 
Bruce's heart to the Holy Land, being : or, three passion-nails conjoined 
in point, sable, piercing a man's heart, gules. Crest: a heart, gules, 
pierced by a passion-nail, proper. Motto : ' Hoc majorum virtus' The 
Logans of England have not the piles conjoined, nor the heart, but 
carry a lion passant in nombril. After the above mission, the piles 
were conjoined (in the heart), and termed passion-nails, as symbolical 
of the three nails wherewith the Saviour's feet and hands were nailed 
to the Cross. In the manuscript collections of Sir James Balfour is a 
drawing of the ' Sigillum Roberti Logan de Restalrick,' 1279, in which 
the piles are simply conjoined in base. The Douglases bear, in com- 
memoration of the mission of their renowned ancestor, a heart ensan- 
guined, with an imperial crown, proper." 

logan's swarthy complexion — now he probably came 

BY IT. 

We have seen that General Logan was descended from the 
Logans of Lastalrig. No mention, however, is made by the 
chronicler of any marked swarthiness of complexion among 
these. But there was another clan of Logans in the north 
of Scotland, from which most of the Logans north of the 
Grampian Hills claim descent, that inhabited East Ross, its 
chiefs living at Ellan-dubh, or the Black Isle ; and it appears 



ADDENDA. 



535 



that, like "the Black Douglas," one of these derived his 
name from his swarthy skin. Says the chronicle from which 
we have already quoted : 

One of these chiefs, who was called Gilliegorm, from his dark 
complexion, was renowned for his warlike powers. He married a rela- 
tive of the Lord Lovat, but he fell into an unfortunate misunderstand- 
ing with the Frasers, arising from some claim . . . which he en- 
deavored to make good by force of arms. Hugh, the second Lord 
Lovat, determined to settle the matter of dispute, summoned to his as- 
sistance twenty-four gentlemen of his name from the south, and, being 
joined by some McRa's and others, he marched with his clan from Aird, 
against Gilliegorm, who had mustered his forces, and was fully prepared 
to meet his enemies. ... A sanguinary battle took place on the 
muir above Kessock, where Logan was slain with most part of his clans- 
men. Lovat plundered the lands and carried off the wife of Gilliegorm, 
who was then with child ; but the barbarous resolution was formed, 
that if it were a male it should be maimed or destroyed, lest, when* 
grown up, the son might avenge the father's death. The child proved: 
a male, but humanity prevailed, and he was suffered to live, there being 
the less to be apprehended from his sickly and naturally deformed ap- 
pearance, from which he received the appellation " Crotach," or hump- 
backed. He was educated by the monks of Beauly, entered holy 
orders, and travelled through the Highlands, founding the churches of 
Kilmor in Skye, and Kilichrinan in Glenelg. He seems to have had a 
dispensation to marry, for he left several children, one of whom, accordr 
ing to a common practice, became a devotee of Finan, a popular High- 
land saint ; and hence he was called Gillie Fhinan, his descendants 
being MacGillie Fhinans. The Fh being aspirated, the pronunciation 
is Ghilli'inan, which has now become McLennan. 

Instead, therefore, of the very improbable story which has 
recently been making the rounds of the press, that the Gen- 
eral owed his swarthiness of complexion to some Indian half- 
breed woman who was not his mother, it is much more likely 
that it, together with his genius for war, was inherited from 
some remote common ancestor of " Gillieo-orm " and' the 
Logans of Lastalrig, or from some less remote ancestor de- 
scended from a later union of those two houses, or possibly 
from a union of the Logans of Lastalrig with the family of the 
" Black Douglas." 



536 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

MRS. GENERAL LOGAN HER PERSONAL APPEARANCE AND AN- 
CESTRY THE STIRRING EVENTS OF HER VARIED LIFE — A 

BRAVE, KIND, DEVOTED, SELF-SACRIFICING, TACTFUL, WOMANLY 
WOMAN. 

The life of General Logan would scarcely be complete 
without more than a casual mention of his estimable wife, 
— now, alas, his inconsolable widow, — who, from the days of 
his earliest Congressional career, proved herself a worthy 
helpmate of her illustrious husband, and besides being most 
self-sacrificing in her devotion to that husband's best inter- 
ests, was also a most affable, charming, bright, and clear- 
headed leader in society. Always at ease herself and pos- 
sessed of great tact, she sets all others in her presence at ease 
— at once a womanly woman, yet with those vivid and just 
perceptions in and knowledge of public affairs befitting a 
statesman's wife. She was thus personally described — prior 
to the General's death — by a recent writer : 

In appearance and manners Mrs. Logan does not at all justify the 
slighting newspaper reports which have appeared concerning her. She 
is a trifle above the medium height, and her figure may well be de- 
scribed as stately ; her movements, too, are graceful and elegant, such 
as become the most polished society. But it was her face, beaming 
with smiles and reflecting in the play of the features her kindness of 
feeling, that revealed the secret of the fascination which she possesses 
for her friends and acquaintances — not merely her intellectual accom- 
plishments, but the amiability of her disposition, her apparent good- 
ness of heart, and those qualifications in general which we are accus- 
tomed to regard as essentially womanly. 

Mrs. Logan's face, which is round rather than oval, and 
shows decision in the chin, is very animated when in conver- 
sation! The forehead is broad at the base, and high, with 
luxuriant hair, once brown, but now a pearly gray, drawn to 
the back of the head, where it is coiled and held by a comb. 
The eyes are light brown, and, in repose, are earnest and 
grave. While much more attractive-looking, she always re- 



ADDENDA. 



537 



minds the writer of Lady Washington. She is very sympa- 
thetic and kind-hearted. Her father, Captain J. M. Cunning- 
ham, who died in 1873, and for whose memory she entertains 
the greatest possible affection, was of Irish ancestry, and 
born in Tennessee, removing while a young man to Peters- 
burg, Boone County, Mo., where he married a Miss Foun- 
taine, a lady of French descent, and where his daughter 
Mary, the subject of this sketch, was born August 15, 1838, 
the eldest of thirteen children. He subsequently with his 
family settled in Illinois. He had as a youth been in the 
Black Hawk War, and when the war with Mexico broke out, 
served in it as Captain of Company B, First Illinois Volun- 
teer Infantry. It was during this war, as we have seen, that 
he became intimate with John A. Logan, then a lieutenant 
in another company of the same regiment. Upon his re- 
turn from Mexico, Captain Cunningham was among the old 
" forty-niners " who went to California. Subsequently, upon 
his return to Illinois, he held the position of Land Register 
at Shawneetown. Besides this position, he held others. He 
was, at various times, sheriff of his county, clerk of the court, 
United States Marshal of the Southern District of Illinois, 
and was a member of the Illinois Legislature in 1845, at the 
same time that General Logan's father, occupied .a seat in 
that body. In fact he was a prominent representative man 
in his part of the country, and was honored and beloved by 
all who knew him. He was always a devoted friend to Gen- 
eral Logan, and did much toward starting and helping him 
in his early career. His daughter Mary was carefully and 
well educated at a convent school, whence she graduated in 
1855, and assisted her father as secretary in the land office 
at Shawneetown, where the General won and wedded her. 
From her earliest childhood, as might be expected in so 
large a family, she always had more or less to do with 
"minding the baby," and looking after the other numerous 
little ones. At the death of her mother, in 1866, five of them 



r 3 8 LIFE 0F LOGAN. 

were left to be looked after; and although what with the 
cares of her own family and of her husband's position, her 
hands were already full enough, she assumed the charge of, 
and became a second mother, as the General was a second 
father, to them, educating and providing for them as if they 
were their own children, until they were all established. 
After the General was elected to Congress, Mrs. Logan 
came to Washington. A careful and well-informed writer in 
the National Tribune, some two years since, sketched the 
interesting story of her life from this time forward as fol- 
lows : 

In i860, the General was re-elected to Congress, and Mrs. Logan 
spent that memorable winter at the capital with him. Scarcely had 
they returned than the news came of the fall of Sumter, and in re- 
sponse to President Lincoln's proclamation convening the new Con- 
gress in extra session, the General was forced to hurry back to Wash- 
ington. Mrs. Logan remained at home at Marion, whither the family 
had removed from Benton, and her position now became one of extreme 
difficulty. 

The General's constituents were largely Southerners or persons of 
Southern descent who had settled in that part of Illinois, and were 
thoroughly in sympathy with the Southern cause, and they were all im- 
patient to know what the General's course would be. His speeches in 
the House of Representatives had already revealed his determination to 
adhere to the Union, and at the battle of Bull Run, instead of remaining 
at Washington, he had joined Colonel Richardson's Michigan Regiment 
and fought with it all day. He was in citizen's dress, and Mrs. Logan 
tells me that she still has the suit he wore on that historic day. 

When it became known, therefore, after the battle, that the General 
was about to return to his district and publicly announce the course he 
intended to pursue, there was the greatest excitement among his con- 
stituents. People even forgot to attend to their ordinary vocations, 
business was suspended, and the farmers, neglecting their crops, came 
pouring into Marion — then a little town of one thousand inhabitants — 
to await their Representative's return, and hear what he had to say. 
Mrs. Logan foresaw that in the excited state of the public mind every- 
thing would depend upon the circumstances under which her husband 
made announcement of his intentions. She could not venture out of 
doors without a crowd collecting about her and questioning her con- 



ADDENDA. 



539 



cerning her husband, and she felt that it was of the utmost consequence 
that he should be able to secure a fair audience and be able to exert 
his personal influence to stay the threatened stampede of the secession- 
ists. Many who afterwards were stanch supporters of the Union were 
then undecided in opinion, and she knew that the slightest untoward 
event might turn the scales. It was essential, indeed, for him to retain 
their confidence, and convince them that his was the only reasonable 
and patriotic course to pursue. Already resolutions of secession had 
been passed at meetings in his district, and Mrs. Logan, and her hus- 
band's -friends, in endeavoring to restrain public opinion until their 
Representative could personally appear and declare his views, had a 
most delicate and dangerous role to play. 

On the day set for his arrival, she drove in a buggy all the way to 
Carbondale, the nearest railway station, twenty-two miles away, to meet 
him, but learning there that the train by which he was to have arrived 
had "missed connections," immediately turned about and drove back 
to Marion. It was evening when she reached there, and the streets 
were still full of people. They crowded in a mass around her buggy 
and demanded to know why her husband had not accompanied her. 
Colonel White, then clerk of the court, and her father, Captain Cun- 
ningham, exerted themselves to pacify the mob, but it was not until the 
sheriff, Mr. Swindell, stood up in her buggy and urged the crowd to 
disperse, assuring it that Logan would surely be there in the morning 
and address them, that the clamor could be quelled. 

Once released from her unpleasant if not perilous position, Mrs. 
Logan turned her horse around, and in the darkness pluckily set out 
again on that long ride to Carbondale. It was two o'clock in the morn- 
ing when the train which bore her husband rolled into the depot, but 
without waiting to rest and refresh themselves, they secured a fresh 
horse and by daylight were once more at Marion. The town was still 
full of people pacing the streets, but on perceiving that General Logan 
had really arrived, and on receiving his promise to address them at 
eleven o'clock, they made no demonstration. 

What occurred afterward, on that memorable morning at 
Marion, when Logan commenced to raise his Thirty-first Illi- 
nois Regiment, has already been given to the reader in the 
earlier pages of this work. But the sketch of Mrs. Logan 
continues thus : 

During this period, and while the regiment was being organized, 
Mrs. Logan acted as his aid-de-camp, frequently carrying his dispatches 



540 LIFE OF LOGAN. 

between Marion and Carbondale and making the long and wearisome 
journey with no other companion than a little boy named Willie Chew. 

From what I have said, you will be prepared to believe that Mrs. 
Logan took every opportunity that offered, to be with the General dur- 
ing his campaigns. She followed him to Cairo, where the troops ren- 
dezvoused, and where his regiment suffered from an epidemic of measles. 
Five hundred of the men were attacked by the disease, and the pur- 
veyor's office and the medical branch of the army were at that time so 
poorly organized that the proper attention could not be given them. 
A hotel had been taken possession of and converted into a so-called 
hospital, but the boys were without cots or beds, and compelled to lie 
on the bare floor with only their knapsacks for pillows. The General 
was naturally solicitous about their condition, and at the first sugges- 
tion from him that something ought to be done, his wife took the train 
for Carbondale, and soon had the kind-hearted ladies of that place, and 
Marion, busily engaged in preparing the necessary supplies, so that 
within thirty-six hours the bare and cheerless hospital was entirely 
revolutionized in appearance. The General succeeded in obtaining 
some cots, and the ladies furnished bountiful supplies of blankets, pil- 
lows, etc. Up to this time, eight or ten poor fellows had died of the 
disease, but after this transformation had been effected in the hospital 
not a single life was lost. Of course the blankets supplied by these 
loyal women were of many colors and patterns, and thus this infirmary 
came to be known as " the Striped Hospital." General Logan's boys 
never forgot her kindness and thoughtfulness on that occasion. 

Mrs. Logan remained at Cairo until the embarkation of the troops, 
and from that city heard the cannonading at Belmont in November. 
In January, 1862, she returned to Marion, but after the battle of Fort 
Donelson, where the General was wounded, she joined him on board 
the Uncle Sam, then lying in the Tennessee River, and afterward had 
him removed to a neighboring house which had been appropriated for 
hospital headquarters, where she tenderly nursed him until he was able 
to rejoin his command, which he did on April 7th, reaching the field of 
Shiloh on the evening of the second day's battle. Mrs. Logan again 
followed him, but upon the movement of the army on Corinth returned 
home. The February following (1863) she saw him again at Memphis, 
where she also ministered to the sick and wounded in the hospital. 
She was particular to look after the comfort of the boys of her hus- 
band's regiment, who were, as she has often told me, every one of them 
" fit to be invited to any gentleman's house." But the time came when 
the troops were ordered off to Vicksburg, and she once more returned 
to Marion. 



ADDENDA. 



541 



So bitter had become the feelings of the Southern sympathizers 
there at that time, however, that she decided to remove to Carbondale, 
where she remained until the close of the war. For a long time she 
had no one to help her except a young lady who has since become the 
wife of General Pearson, and these two, I know, used to personally 
take, care of the six or seven head of horses that she had brought from 
Marion. At last she picked up an old colored man — a refugee — and 
was promptly notified by her rebel neighbors that if she did not at once 
dismiss him they would raid her house. The old man was badly 
scared, but she told him that if they ventured to carry out their threat 
they should have the best she had in the shape of shot, — she had pro- 
vided herself with arms and ammunition, — and they prudently refrained 
from molesting her. Fortunately, she was kept well-posted as to what 
was going on. On one occasion she was informed that one of her 
neighbors, to whom she had been particularly kind and obliging, was 
about to lead a party in a night attack on her house with a view to capt- 
uring her colored servant. Not disconcerted in the least, she went 
straight to the ringleader and told him that if he touched a hair of the 
old darkey's head she would see that he was arrested and brought to 
justice ! She was never afterward molested and when her friends urged 
her to leave Southern Illinois for a less turbulent section of the country, 
she always declared that this was a free country, and she was deter- 
mined, whatever came of it, to stay where she was. It required a good 
deal of genuine grit to maintain that position in those troublous times 
in Southern Illinois ; and Mrs. Logan, I know, cannot even yet think 
of them with composure ; yet she lived to see the day when the old 
friendships were re-established, and she says very truly that almost any 
of the people of that section would die for General Logan now, and 
that she retains the strongest affection for them. 

It was not until after the fall of Vicksburg that Mrs. Logan again 
saw the General. He came North early in August to fight the enemies 
of the Union at home, and for a month participated in the exciting 
campaign of 1863, returning to Chattanooga toward the close of Sep- 
tember, and assuming command of the Fifteenth Corps. Then fol- 
lowed that brilliant campaign which terminated in the fall of Atlanta. 
The General had won his brigadier-general's stars at Donelson and his 
major-general's at Vicksburg, and in the Atlanta campaign he once 
more covered himself with glory. At its close, however, in the autumn 
of 1864, he was needed at home to rally our faint-hearted citizens to 
the support of President Lincoln, and husband and wife were once 
more united. When the General again took the field it was to find his 
command at Savannah, at the conclusion of its famous "March to the 



542 



•LIFE OF LOGAN. 



Sea." The Confederacy was then on the eve of dissolution, and soon 
the fall of Richmond and the surrender of Lee were followed by the 
capitulation of Johnston and the general dispersion of the Confederate 
armies. Then came the grand review at Washington, regarding which 
Mrs. Logan has often told me that it is one of the regrets of her life 
that she was unable to witness that magnificent procession of returning 
heroes. At the time she was at her home in Carbondale, 111., and John 
A. Logan, Jr., was only three days old. 

The war over, General Logan returned home with the intention of 
resuming the practice of his profession. Prior to the outbreak of the 
rebellion he had already acquired an enviable reputation at the bar, 
and on entering the service he had paid over to Mrs. Logan, as I hap- 
pen to know, $10,000 in $20 gold pieces as the sum of his gains. But 
he was not allowed to carry out his plans. He consented to accept the 
nomination for Congressman-at-Large, and his public career from that 
date to this is known to everybody. I allude to it only because it af- 
forded a wider field for the display of that wifely devotion in which 
during the trying times of the war Mrs. Logan had never faltered. 

She has often been the subject of comment because she participated 
in her husband's campaigns ; but the fact is that she accompanied him 
solely because of the profound attachment that existed between the 
two and their mutual unwillingness to be separated from each other. 
Naturally, his friends became hers, and she acquired such a familiarity 
with his affairs as to be able to lighten his cares and share his burdens 
with him. It is so unusual to find a woman of domestic tastes taking 
such an intimate interest in her husband's public career that it is not 
strange that she should be thought masculine in temperament and dis- 
position ; but nothing could be farther from the truth. Education and 
experience have fitted her to be in the truest sense a helpmate to her 
husband, and if she has undertaken at times to conduct a part of his 
correspondence, in addition to discharging those domestic and social 
duties which her position imposed upon her, it is because it is a labor 
of love with her, prompted by no unwomanly ambition, but simply by 
her affection for her husband. 

A happier couple I do not know, and their happiness is in one sense 
the result of making other people happy. Mrs. Logan, as I have said, 
was the eldest of thirteen children, — seven girls and six boys, — and upon 
her largely fell the burden of their education and support. Lovingly 
she fulfilled the trust, "unselfish in that as in everything else. Three 
sisters and two brothers are still living, but Captain Cunningham died in 
1873 an d her mother in 1866. Mrs. Logan has had three children born 
to her. The first — a boy — died in infancy ; the second is now the wife 



ADDENDA. 



543 



of Paymaster Tucker ; while the third, " Manning," or, as he is called 
since taking the full name of his father, John A. Logan, Jr., is a cadet 
at West Point. Her religion is that of the Methodist Church, of which 
she became a member shortly after her marriage, although her family 
were all connected with the denomination known as the "Christian 
Church." General Logan joined the Methodist Church at Carbondale 
in 1869. 

It is unnecessary for me to say that the General's and Mrs. Logan's 
attachment for the people of Southern Illinois, among whom their 
youth was passed, has but strengthened with time. One of the first 
acts of the General on becoming firmly established at the bar was to 
purchase the old homestead in Jackson County, where he was born, and 
he still owns it, although his brother Tom is now occupying the place, 
which consists of about five hundred acres. The house, I remember, 
was built of logs, weather-boarded, and was considered quite a preten- 
tious mansion in its day, but only the ruins are now to be seen. It was 
burned to the ground some three years ago. 

But I am at the end of my story. I only wanted you to know what 
Mrs. Logan's life has really been — how full of self-sacrifice, of womanly 
devotion, of brave actions and kindly deeds. 

Such is the story, told by another, of Mrs. Logan's stir- 
ring life from the winter of 1860-61 down to two years ago. 
But, since then, how dramatic have been the changes in it, 
ordained by Fate ! A comfortable, spacious, beautiful home 
established at Calumet Place, overlooking the National capi- 
tal ; the assurance of a long . period of increasing political 
power and social influence ; opportunity for lengthy and pleas- 
ant sojournings throughout the States amid the joyous greet- 
ings of the people ; the fast ripening prospects of Presidential 
probabilities ; and then, alas, all blighted and blackened by 
the dread shadow of the Angel of Death ! Truly, the glory 
of her life has departed. 



APPENDIX. 



PART I.— SENATE EULOGIES UPON LOGAN. 



TRIBUTES OF UNITED STATES SENATORS CULLOM, MORGAN, EDMUNDS, MANDERSON, HAMP- 
TON, ALLISON, HAWLEY, SPOONER, COCKRELL, FRYE, PLUMB, EVARTS, SABIN, PALMER, 
AND FARWELL, TO LOGAN'S CHARACTER AND ACHIEVEMENTS. 

On February 9, 1887, the sixty-first anniversary of Logan's birth, immediately after the 
reading of the journal, Senator Cullom introduced, in the United States Senate, the follow- 
ing resolutions : 

Resolved by the Senate, That as an additional mark of respect to the memory of John A. Logan, long a 
Senator from the State of Illinois, and a distinguished member of this body, business be now suspended, that 
the friends and associates of the deceased may pay fitting tribute to his public and private virtues. 

Resolved, That the Secretary of the Senate be directed to communicate these resolutions 10 the House of 
Representatives and to furnish an engrossed copy of the same to the family of the deceased Senator. 

SENATOR SHKLBY M. CULLOM [REP.], OF ILLINOIS, THEREUPON SAID : 

To-day we lay our tribute of love upon the tomb of Logan. Suffering from a sense of 
personal loss too deep to find expression, I despair of being able to render adequate praise 
to his memory. But yesterday, as it were, he stood among us here in the full flush of ro- 
bust manhood. A giant in strength and endurance, with a will of iron, and a constitution 
tough as the sturdy oak, he seemed to hold within his grasp more than the threescore years 
and ten allotted to man. No one thought in the same moment of Logan and death — two 
conquerors who should come face to face, and the weaker yield to the stronger. It seemed 
as if Logan could not die. Yet, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, as it were, 
"God's finger touched him, and he slept." . . . Had he lived until to-day, sixty-one 
years — eventful, glorious years — would have rested their burden as a crown upon his head. 
Life is a crucible into which we are thrown to be tried. How many but prove the presence 
of alloy so base that refining " seven times " cannot purify. But here was a life generous and 
noble, an open book from which friend and foe alike might read the character of the man. 
Placing party and platforms under his feet, he was first of all for the Union and 
the flag, which were dearer than all else to him. With the flash of the first gun which 
thundered its doom upon Sumter he was up and in arms. Consecrating all the energy of 
his ardent nature to the cause of the Union, he left his seat in Congress, saying he could 
best serve his country in the field. Falling into the ranks of the Union army he took his 
part as a civilian volunteer in the first battle of Bull Run. 

During the war General Logan rose by regular promotion through every grade from 
colonel to the highest rank, save that of lieutenant-general, that the nation could bestow 
in recognition of his bravery and great capacity as an officer. Is it enough to say of Gen- 
eral Logan that he was the greatest volunteer general of the Union army? By no means. 
A quarter of a century and more has passed since that terrible struggle, and civil honors 
were won by him during that period as rapidly as military ones were won during the 
war. 

You will call to mind, Mr. President, General Logan's speeches on education, on the 
needs of the army, his defence of General Grant, and his arraignment of General Fitz John 
Porter. These constitute an important part of the records of senatorial debates, and 
should be classed among the ablest and most exhaustive speeches ever made in the Senate. 
As a political leader General Logan was conspicuously successful. He was naturally in the 
front rank, whether on the field of battle or in political contests. Living in an era when 



54^ 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



corruption was not uncommon, when strong men of both parties sometimes stood agl.ast 
and saw their reputations Masted by public exposure, he remained throughout his long 
public career above suspicion. Wealth could not tempt him to soil his spotless name. He 
never used the opportunities of his official position as a means of obtaining gold. He died 
as he had lived, a poor man. In the last national campaign, when he bore aloft so valiantly 
the colors of his party, there was no ghost of dishonor in his past to rise up and cry upon 
him shame. May his children " rejoice and be glad " in the example of a father of whom 
the whole nation could rise up and say, "There was an honest man." . . . Mr. Presi- 
dent, few men in American history have left so positive an impress on the public mind and 
so glorious a record to be known and read of all men as has General Logan. The pen of 
tin historian cannot fail to write the name of Logan as one prominently identified with the 
great movements and measures which have saved the Union and made the nation free and 
great and glorious within the last thirty years. . . . 

SENATOR JOHN T. MORGAN [DEM.], OF ALABAMA, SAID: 

Mr. President: . . . John A. Logan was, more than almost any man in my remem- 
brance, the typical American of the Western States. He was born and reared in the West, 
that country of marvellous strength, power, and progress. All of his efforts were given to 
the service, first, of that particular section, and afterward to the more enlarged service of the 
general country. But Logan seemed to be the embodiment of the spirit and power of that 
w tnderful West, which has grown and strengthened in our country as no other section of 
this Union ever has within a given time. The energy of his nature, the fortitude, the per- 
sistence, the industry, the courage with which he encountered every question that arose, 
seemed merely to exemplify the pervading spirit of the western part of the United States, 
and he will go down to posterity, not because we describe him in our speeches here to-day, 
but because he has described himself in every act of his life as a man perfectly understood 
and the recognized exemplar of one of the strongest and most splendid types of American 
character. . . . Men who thought and felt as I have thought and felt always gladly 
stretch forth the hand of honest brotherhood to men like John A. Logan. We were never 
afraid of such men because they were candid and true. No guile beset that man's life, no 
evasion, n > finesse. No merely political strategy ever characterized his conduct in public 
life or marred his honor in private life. He was a bold, pronounced, dignified, earnest, 
manly, firm, generous, true man, and I value the opportunity to express these sentiments 
about such a man on the floor of the Senate on this solemn occasion. ... I believe 
that no man has died in this country in half a century for whom the people of the United 
Slates at large had a more genuine respect or in whom they had greater confidence than in 
General Logan. The Senate has witnessed on various occasions his antagonism even to his 
best friends when his convictions led him to separate from them upon political and other 
questions that have been brought before the Senate. Always courageous, always firm, 
always true, you knew exactly wnere to place him ; and when his manly form strode across 
the Senate Chamber and he took his seat among his brethren of this body this country as 
well as this august tribunal felt that a man had appeared of valor and strength and real 
ability. . . . lie was a true husband, a true father, a true friend, and when that is 
said of a man, and you can add to it alsj that he was a true patriot, a true soldier, and a 
true statesman, I do not know what else could be grouped into the human character to 
make it more sublime than that. 

SENATOR GEORGE F. EDMUNDS [REP.], OF VERMONT, SAID: 

Mr. President: I first' knew General Logan about twenty years ago. He was then a 
member of the House of Representatives, and I had just come to the Senate. His fame as 
a s tidier, "I i ourse, was well known to me. His personal characteristics I then knew noth- 
ing of. 1 soon nut him in committees of conference and otherwise as representing the 
opinions of the House of Representatives in matters of difference with the Senate, and 
1 was struck, as everybody has been who has known him, with the very extraordinary char- 
acteristics that he possessed. They have been stated by his colleague who first addressed 
y hi, and by my friend on the other side of the Chamber — the characteristic of candor, the 
characteristic of simplicity of statement, the characteristic of clearness of opinion, the char- 
acteristic of that Anglo-Saxon persistence in upholding an opinion once formed that has 
made our British ancestors and our own people the strongest forces for civilization of which 
wi havi an) account in the history of the world. 

There was no preteno about the man; there was no ambuscade ; there was no obscu- 
rity. Wli i or, he understood his reason for being for, stated it briefly and clearly, 



APPENDIX. 



547 



and stuck to it ; and that, as we all know, and as it always ought to be, means in the great 
majority of instances success, and where success fails it is an instance of honorable defeat. 

His industry, Mr. President, which I have so long had opportunity to know, and to 
know intimately, for later when he came to the Senate it was my good fortune to serve with 
him in one of the committees of the Senate having a very large amount of work to do — 
his industry, as well as these other characteristics that I have spoken of, was of the 
greatest. 

His was the gentlest of hearts, the truest of natures, the highest of spirits, that feels and 
considers the weaknesses of human nature and who does not let small things stand in the 
way of his generous friendship and affection for those with whom he is thrown. And so in 
the midst of a career that had been so honorable in every branch of the public service, and 
with just ambitions and just powers to a yet longer life of great public usefulness, he disap- 
pears from among us — not dead — promoted, as I think, leaving us to mourn, not his de- 
parture for his sake, but that the value of his conspicuous example, the strength of his con- 
spicuous experience in public affairs, and the wisdom of his counsels have been withdrawn. 

And so I mourn him for ourselves, not for himself ; and so I look upon an occasion like 
this not so much — far from it — for the regrets that belong to personal separations as the 
testimonial that a great body like this should make for ourselves and for our people of a 
recognition of the merits and of the examples and of the services that are to be not only a 
memorial but an inspiration to us all and to all our countrymen as to the just recognition 
and worth of noble deeds and honest desires. And so I lay my small contribution upon 
his grave in this way. 

SENATOR CHARLES F. MANDERSON [REP.], OF NEBRASKA, SAID : 

Mr. President : As I stood a few weeks ago by the vault that received within its gloomy 
walls the honored remains of John Alexander Logan, . . . the familiar bugle-call 
brought most vividly to my recollection the first time I met our friend and brother, nearly 
twenty-five years ago. The disaster to our arms on dread Chickamauga's bloody day — the 
only battle approaching defeat that the Army of the Cumberland had ever known — had been 
redeemed by the glorious and substantial victories of Mission Ridge and Lookout Mountain. 
These battles had been won with the aid of the Army of the Tennessee, and Sherman, its 
leader, had come to fight by the side of Thomas, "The Rock of Chickamauga. '' 

With Grant, the great captain, to direct the movements of these most able lieutenants, 
the victory was assured, and with the capture of the rebel stronghold upon the frowning 
heights of Mission Ridge and lofty Lookout the Georgia campaign, that ended in the capt- 
ure of Atlanta and the march to the sea, that "broke the back of the rebellion," became 
possibilities. The fair fame of our brethren of the Tennessee was familiar to us of the 
Army of the Cumberland. We had fought by their side at Shiloh. We knew of their high 
emprise at Corinth, Champion Hills, and Vicksburg. We had heard and read of Sherman, 
McPherson, and Logan. 

I do not disparage the bright fame of either of the first two when I say that the chief 
interest centred at that time about the name of the third of these famous leaders of the 
Army of the Tennessee. 

I first saw Logan in front of the Confederate position on Kenesaw Mountain, when his 
corps made that desperate assault upon Little Kenesaw — so fruitless in results, so costly in 
human life. The sight was an inspiration. Well mounted — "he looked of his horse a 
part." His swarthy complexion, long black hair, compact figure, stentorian voice, and 
eyes that seemed to blaze "with the light of battle," made a figure once seen never to be 
forgotten. In action he was the very spirit of war. His magnificent presence would make 
a coward fight. He seemed a resistless force. 

The sword 
Of Michael, from the armory of God, 
Was gtven him, tempered so that neither keen 
Nor so'id might resist that edge. 

The splendid record of achievements won along the Mississippi was to remain unbroken. 
His name is written upon every page of the Georgia campaign of over one hundred days of 
constant fighting. Says one of the historians of the Army of the Cumberland : "As the 
united armies advanced along the battle-line, where for four months the firing never wholly 
ceased by day or by night, everybody came to know Logan. Brave, vigilant, and aggressive, 
he won universal applause. Prudent for his men and reckless in exposing his own person, 
he excited general admiration. 



543 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



When the lines were close his own headquarters were often scarcely out of sight of the 
pickets, and he generally had a hand in whatever deadly work might spring up along his 
front. 

At Resaca, at Dallas, in front of frowning Kenesaw, at Peach Tree Creek and New 
Hope Church his corps under his leadership added to its fame. When McPherson was 
killed Logan assumed temporary command of the Army of the Tennessee, and "wrested 
victory from the jaws of defeat. " We of the Cumberland heard the noise of the cannon 
and the rattle of ihe musketry that told of the severe assaults made by the desperate foe on 
Logan's line. I visited the field the next morning and saw the terrible results of the deadly 
struggle. 

The ground was thickly strewn with the slain, and the face of nature had been changed 
by the conflict as though 

Men had fought upon the earth and fiends in upper air. 

Logan's battle presence here is said to have been sublime. The death of his beloved 
comrade-in-arms seemed to transform him into a very Moloch. Bareheaded he rode his 
lines, encouraging his men by word and deed his battle-cry, "McPherson and revenge." 
Sherman's official report of the battle says : 

The brave and gallant General Logan nobly sustained his reputation and that of his veteran army and 
avenged the death of his comrade and commander. 

I would fain speak of Ezra Chapel and Jonesborough, but lack of time forbids. 

On September 2d the campaign of constant fighting that began May 2d closed by the 
occupation of Atlanta, and no one man did more to bring about the glorious result than he 
whose death we to-day deplore. Of his services during the march from Savannah through 
the Carolinas I cannot take time to speak. He rode at the head of the victorious veterans 
of the Army of the Tennessee at the Grand Review. Long its leader, he had at last be- 
come its commander. No more knightly figure appeared in the marching columns. No 
braver or truer heart swelled with the lofty emotions of the hour. 

Through all of General Logan's military career it is evident that he was far more than 
a mere soldier. Although terribly at home upon the field of battle it was not love of the 
life that took him there. His sensitive and sympathetic nature caused him many unhappy 
hours as he saw the horrors war had wrought. He was no mere seeker for " the bubble 
reputation." The speeches made and letters written immediately before and during the 
great struggle for national existence show him to have been imbued with the spirii of lofti- 
est patriotism. 

The trait in his character upon which my thoughts dwell with fondness and emotion 
was his generous regard for the rights of others. It shone out conspicuously in his treat- 
ment of that noble soldier and true patriot, General George II. Thomas, whom all men 
loved. There was impatience that Thomas did not move to the attack of Hood. The fact 
that the rain, which froze as it fell, covered the earth with ice upon which man or beast 
could scarcely stand was really cause sufficient for delay. 

Logan was ordered to supersede the great leader of the Cumberland Army. He pro- 
ceeded westward without haste, although the command of that splendid army of veterans 
was something greatly to be desired. Reaching Louisville and hearing that the thaw had 
e >me and Thomas ready to move, he delayed in that city. The glorious news of the great 
victory at Nashville soon came to him. Logan, with the older assigning him to supreme 
e immand in his pocket, telegraphed the glad tidings to Washington and asked that Thomas 
might remain at the head of the men who had followed him for so many years, and that he 
return to the interior command. 

.V. desire lor self-advancement could prompt him to disregard the rights of a comrade. 
With mi a murmur he had before this time seen the command of the Army of the Tennes- 
see pass to another when it seemed matter of right that it should be his as the natural suc- 
.,1 the lamented McPherson. General Hooker, with less of claim, wanted it, and in 
his grii \ ius disappointment asked to be relieved from duty. Logan did not sulk an instant, 
but, with unselfish patri >tism, went wherever dmy called. 

li i- n .I my purp ise to speak of the great dead in any other capacity than that of a sol- 
dier. I .' ' othei il I him as a citizen, lawyer, legislator, statesman, and tell of his 
merits a- . itizen, husband, father, and friend. I was his recognized comrade, as was every 
othei man who wore the blue. He never forgot them. They will never forget him. 



APPENDIX. 549 

SENATOR WADE HAMPTON [DEM.], OF SOUTH CAROLINA, SAID: 

Mr. President : . . . For one, I join gladly in every mark of respect paid to the 
memory of General Logan. . . . As a Democrat, a Southern man, and a Confederate 
soldier, I am called on to speak of him, as a Republican in high and deserved honor with 
his party, as a Northern man who offered his life, and gave his blood to prove the sincerity 
of his convictions, and as a Federal soldier whose fame was as wide-spread as it was fairly 
achieved. ... I may say, in connection with his brilliant military service, and it is 
due to him that I should say it, that when war was flagrant, and the passions of men were 
inflamed to their highest pitch, we of the South knew of no act of cruelty, of barbarity, or 
of inhumanity to stain his record as a brave and honorable soldier. I shall speak of him 
as I knew him here, as a Senator and as a man ; and while we held opposite opinions on 
nearly all of the great questions which have divided parties in this country, I hope that I 
may be able to speak with impartiality and with truth. His ability commanded my admir- 
ation ; his many high qualities won my personal regard, and every feeling of my heart 
prompts me to do full justice to his merits. My acquaintance with General Logan began 
upon my entrance into this body. ... I found myself placed on the Committee on 
Military Affairs, of which he was a member, and over which he subsequently presided as 
chairman for years, zealously and efficiently. 

Our service together on that committee was continuous from that time until death freed 
him from earthly labors, and my long association with him there taught me to respect his 
great ability and to admire the many good and generous traits which marked his character 
so strongly. 

The characteristics which gave him marked individuality as chairman of the Military 
Committee were constantly illustrated on the floor of the Senate, A strong adherent and 
supporter of his party, he never failed to assert his independence of thought and of action 
whenever he deemed that his duty demanded this. Frank, fearless, and outspoken, he 
professed in an eminent degree the courage which springs from sincere convictions, and he 
had the ability to defend these convictions. While doing this he dealt heavy blows, but they 
were always delivered in an open, straightforward, manly manner. He never fought in am- 
bush ; he asked only an open field and fair play. Possessing as he did so many rare and 
generous attributes, it is not strange that he found warm friends even among his political 
opponents, nor is it surprising that he was a tower of strength to his own party. 

His services, his talents, commanded the position of a leader, and he fitted that posi- 
tion ably. The ancient Romans, Mr. President, regarded courage as among the highest 
virtues, and the word used by them to express this quality has given to our language its 
beautiful word "virtue." . . . No braver man ever lived, and the Almighty Creator 
endowed him with many other and great virtues. 

SENATOR WILLIAM B. ALLISON [REP.], OF IOWA, SAID : 

Mr. President : Whosoever shall hereafter faithfully write the annals of our country's 
history for the last quarter of a century will have occasion to speak often and in words of 
high praise the name of General John A. Logan. 

Others have spoken of his early history in Mexico, at the bar, and in the State Legis- 
lature, all preliminary to a larger field, opening up to him in the National Congress and upon 
the great theatre of war. He first appeared in the National Capitol and took a seat in the 
House of Representatives, to which he had been elected from the State of Illinois in De- 
cember, 1859. He was elected as a Democrat. . . . He arrayed himself on the side 
of the great leader of one faction of the Democratic party, and in the Presidential struggle 
of i860, espoused the cause of this great leader, with all the zeal of his strong personality, 
and in his own State aimed heavy blows at the Republican party, and the Southern wing of 
his own. 

That struggle ended in the election of President Lincoln, which was soon followed by 
the opening of a struggle of a very different nature. This conflict of arms, though long 
predicted by many, at last came suddenly upon the country without preparation. 
General Logan did not hesitate, but at once, with his great leader, arrayed himself on the 
side of his country. So deciding he immediately resigned his seat in Congress. . . 

General Logan reappeared in the Capitol as a Representative in March, 1867, and from 
that time until his death, except for a period of two years, he was continuously a member 
either of the House or of the Senate. 

The questions then prominent were questions growing out of the war, covering the en- 
tire range and scope of the powers of the General Government, the reorganization of the 



ceo LIFE 0F LOGAN. 

Army, the management of the public debt, the reduction of taxes, changes in our tariff and 
internal revenue systems, the currency, specie payments, the new amendments to the Con- 
stitution, and the restoration of the States deprived of representation because of the rebel- 
lion. All these questions and many others were in a brief space of time forced upon Con- 
gress for its consideration. General Logan had decided views npon them all, and 
expressed his views fearlessly and with great force and power. 

General Logan was transferred to this Chamber in 1871. He was then in the full vigor 
of his matured faculties, and brought with him the valuable experience of a long service in 
the House, and at once took high rank in the Senate, which he maintained undiminished to 
the end, always taking an active part in the discussion of the great questions constantly ap- 
pearing here for action. His sympathy with his old comrades, and their devotion to his 
personal fortunes, imposed upon him unusual labor in caring for their interests and welfare. 

He was assiduous and constant in the advocacy of all the measures which he and they 
deemed of especial interest to them, whether respecting pensions, bounty, back pay, or the 
reorganization of the Army itself, and he became their conspicuous advocate and friend. 
So that for all the years following the war whatever legislation there is upon our statute- 
books upon these topics bears the impress of his advocacy. . . 

This brief retrospect discloses that the life of General Logan was one of ceaseless activ- 
ity and exceptional usefulness to his country. Few men of this generation in our country 
have achieved a more illustrious career. Coming into active political life at the beginning 
of the great Civil War he has linked his name imperishably with the military achievements 
that resulted in the restoration of the Union. Coming into the councils of the nation soon 
after the close of hostilities, he bore an honorable part in the legislation which then seemed 
necessary for the perpetuation of the Union. 

When we met in December only six Senators appeared in their seats who were in this 
Chamber fourteen years ago, when I entered it. One of these was General Logan ; and 
of all the men who have come and gone in these intervening years, none were more con- 
spicuous, and none will be more missed by the country and by those of us who still remain. 
. . . In his death the nation has lost one of its ablest counsellors, his comrades in the 
army one of their most ardent and devoted supporters, we in this Chamber a valued co- 
worker and friend. 

SENATOR JOSEPH R. HAWLEY [REI\], OF CONNECTICUT, SAID: 

Mr. President : A stranger seeing General Logan for the first time and observing him 
in these Halls a few days ago would perhaps have said that the most prominent feature of 
his character was his combativeness. He snuffed the battle afar off ; he never lagged in 
the rear of the column ; he crowded to the front ; he never shirked the combat ; he went 
out to look for it. He had a matchless courage, as everybody knows, a courage 

not only upon the battlefield, but a high courage and spirit of self-sacrifice in politics. He 
had a right to suppose from all that was said to him by great multitudes, that he was a fair 
and honorable candidate for the Presidency, yet he cheerfully accepted a subordinate posi- 
tion upon a Presidential ticket in 1884 in the belief, in which he was strengthened by friends, 
that his influence and his acquaintance with tens of thousands of soldiers would bring some- 
thing of strength to his political party. . . . He went into the war. Afler Vicksburg 
General Grant said that McPherson and Logan had demonstrated their fitness to become 
the commanders of independent armies. He had a right to suppose, after the gallant 
McPherson had fallen, under the very feet of an advancing and temporarily triumphant 
Confederate force, he had a fair right to suppose that he would succeed to that officer's 
command. He was second in rank. The soldiers desired it. They had seen his great 
leadership on that battlefield as on many others. Another took the place, an honorable 
and gallant soldier. 

The manly generosity and high courtesy of his bearing when he was ordered to relieve 
the noble General Thomas have been described to-day. I do not contrast General Logan's 
action on that occasion with the conduct of certain others in similar situations, though there 
were examples of wonderful contrast ; but he was as obedient as a child, faithful as 
ever. 

Scandal spared General Logan from its insinuations of dishonor in private or public life. 
Perhaps calumnious mud was thrown at him, but nothing of it is recorded or even retained 
in the memi >i i<-s of men, 

I I I ived his country. Why, sir, that is true of sixty millions of people, I hope ; but he 

loved it with a devotion immeasurable and unfathomable. He believed in the justice, the 

I lity, ami the liberty of its Constitution and its laws. He hadno doubt whatever of the 



APPENDIX. 55 1 

wisdom of this great experiment, universal suffrage and all. lie was no agnostic ; he had 
a creed and a purpose always, in every contest. He did not assume all knowledge ; but 
what he knew, he knew he knew ; and what he believed he was always ready to say. What- 
ever he wanted, he greatly wanted; he was very much in earnest, lie trusted the great 
jury of twelve million voters, and had no doubt about the future prosperity, honor, and 
glory of the great Republic. 

He was an ambitious man, politically ; he had a right to be, and he won a high place. 
He was ambitious of a great place among soldiers, and he won it. 

He was generous, he was frank, he was tender. Possibly that will sound strangely to 
many people who did not know him as we did. He had as tender a heart as entered these 
doors. He was one of the bravest men physically and morally that ever lived. He was a 
brilliant and great volunteer soldier. He was an incorruptible citizen and legislator. His 
patriotism was unsurpassed in enthusiasm, intensity, and faith. 

SENATOR JOHN C. SPOONER [REP.], OF WISCONSIN, SAID : 

Mr. President : The busy hand of death beckons us again to the side of a new-made 
grave. Amid the tears and sobs of this great people, to the music of muffled drums, and 
under the furled flag which he loved, we tenderly bore John A. Logan to his rest. 
No one need fear for Logan the cold analysis of the historian yet to come. How little de- 
pendent is this man's fame upon the speech of his contemporaries. It rests upon the solid 
foundation of glorious deeds and splendid public service. . . . It is said that " his- 
tory is the essence of innumerable biographies." Logan's life is of the essence of our his- 
tory. With him, love of country was a passion, and with him the union of States was 
"the country." He could see, save through the perpetuity of that Union, nothing of any 
worth in the future of the Republic. 

His star shot into the sky at Belmont, to shine fixed and unobscured forever. 

It would be idle for me to recount the battles which he fought and won, the precipitous 
charges which he led, the marvellous personal magnetism and daring which, communicating 
itself to a whole army, turned, as by the will-power of one man, defeat into victory. It is 
enough to say of him as a soldier that by common consent he stands forth the ideal volun- 
teer soldier of the war. He was, among a million brave men, original, picturesque, and 
unique. There was but one John A. Logan. 

But, great as he was in war, he was great also as an orator of the people, and in the 
councils of peace. He won as an orator a reputation which, if he had no other claim to be 
remembered, would keep his name alive and would satisfy any reasonable ambition. His 
popularity as a speaker was not ephemeral, nor was it peculiar to any section. He was 
everywhere welcome. Listening thousands hung in rapt interest upon his words. It is not 
at all difficult to account for his power as a speaker. His evident sincerity and earnestness, 
his commanding presence, the flash of his eye, the like of which I never saw in any other 
face, the boldness of his utterance, the impetuous flow of his speech, and the trumpet tones 
of his voice, gave to him as a popular orator a charm indescribable. 

As the nominee of his party for the second great office in the gift of the people, he- 
added greatly to his civic fame. The dignity of his bearing, the method and manner of his 
thought and speech, were everywhere a revelation to those who then heard him for the first 
time. 

He possessed, also, indisputable claims to high statesmanship. Look through the 
statutes and the records of Congress, and you will find there the strong impress of his char- 
acter and individuality. 

Though a chieftain of his party, he was not narrow or sectional as a legislator. He met 
more than half-way those who had but lately been his adversaries on the held of battle. 
No man more desired the restoration of perfect harmony between the sections or the up- 
building of the waste places of the South or gave readier aid to that great consummation. 
He demanded only in return that every man and woman and child, of whatever condition, 
class, or degree, should enjoy unobstructed and in the fullest measure every right given by 
the Constitution and the laws. With less than this he thought it moral treason to be con- 
tent. 

Logan was a leader by divine right. All the elements combined to make him such. 
Of resistless energy, iron will, knightly daring, lofty moral courage, quick and acute intelli- 
gence, fervent patriotism, unselfish loyalty to principle and friendship, and unswerving 
honor, it is impossible to conceive of him as other than a great leader in any held of human 
effort. . . . 

He will live, sir, in the hearts of men until the history of his time shall have faded ut- 



552 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



terly away. With each returning May, wherever there is a soldier's grave — and where is 
there not a soldier's grave ? — the people now living and those to come after us will remember 
the name of Logan, the patriot, soldier, orator, and statesman, and will bring, in honor of 
his memory, the beautiful flowers of the spring-time and the sweet incense of praise and 
prayer. 

SENATOR FRANCIS M. COCKRELL [UEM.], OF MISSOURI, SAID : 

Mr. PRESIDENT : With profound sorrow and deep grief I join in paying the last official 
tribute of respect, honor, friendship, and love to the memory of our late distinguished col- 
league, John Alexander Logan 

However widely we may have differed upon many questions, I respected, admired, hon- 
ored, and loved him for his many noble, manly, generous, magnanimous, and chivalrous 
qualities of head and heart — the distinguishing attributes of the true soldier and great man 
among all nations and tongues. . . . Among all the many great and distinguished 
volunteer officers during the late war it is no disparagement of any of them to say that Gen- 
eral Logan was the greatest and most distinguished. Courageous, fearless, energetic, un- 
tiring, generous, and dashing, he was the beau ideal of the American volunteer soldiery. 
P"or four long, weary years, during the greatest military conflict the world has ever beheld, 
General Logan, as a private soldier, a commander of a regiment, then of a brigade, then of 
a division, then of an army corps, and then of an army, met and satisfied the highest ex- 
pectations and demands of the administration, the country, and the people. No man could 
do more. As a Representative and Senator in the Congress of the United States he was in- 
corruptible, faithful, diligent, and laborious, and was earnest in his convictions and forcible 
and aggressive in their advocacy. 

The name, the fame, the life, and the illustrious and successful achievements of General 
Logan are now the common heritage of our great country and people, and will be cherished 
and remembered by the present and coming generations. 

The life and achievements of Logan, cast upon the bosom of the public life in the 
United States, have started waves of influence and power for good which will widen and 
extend until they break against the shores of eternity in the resurrection morning. 

SENATOR WILLIAM P. FRYE [REP.], OF MAINE, SAID : 

Mr. President: Senators have brought to-day, and will bring, garlands and wreaths 
with which to decorate the grave of our dead soldier and Senator. I shall content myself 
with offering a single flower. 

Logan was an honest man. I do not mean by that simply that he would not steal, that 
he would not bear false witness, that he had not an itching palm for a bribe. ... I 
do not regard it as eulogistic of this great man to say that he was honest in that narrow 
sense. I do not cripple my declaration by any such limitation, nor sustain it by any such 
questionable testimony. I mean that General Logan had an honest mind, an honest pur- 
pose, an honest habit of thinking. I mean that he never played tricks with his mental 
machinery to serve his own ends and his own purposes. I mean that he never attempted 
jugglery with it. I mean that he permitted it, in spite of his ambitions, his prejudices, his 
jealousies, and his passions, to move straight forward in its operations ; and that the legiti- 
mate results were convictions — convictions followed always by earnest, determined, intense 
action. In my opinion that largely constituted General Logan's strength in the Senate, in 
the Army, and with the people. 

War came on. He believed that war was a serious fact ; that it was to be waged for 
the suppression of rebellion and the restoration of the Union. Hence in every council of 
war his voice was always for battle, and in every battle he was ever at the front. 

When in the midst of the war preferment was offered him, aye, more, urged upon him 
by his friends, he did not hesitate a moment, but with emphasis declared to them that he 
had enlisted for the war, and that, God helping him, he would light it out on that line to 
the end. When he was superseded, as he believed unjustly, as has been well said to-day, 
he did not sulk in his tent a single hour, but marched straight forward in the line of duty. 

When the war was over, the Union was restored, and peace was enthroned, and a grate- 
ful people showered upon him public honors he exhibited everywhere the same characteris- 
tics. Take the ease which lias been alluded to here to-day of General Porter. Logan be- 
lieved, whether justly or unjustly is not for me to say, that this man was jealous of his 
superiors, that criticisms and complaints subversive of discipline were made by him, that he 
neglected plain and open duly, that he refused to obey peremptory orders, and that his 
punishment was just. In this Chamber we listened to his matchless, marvellous, powerful, 



APPENDIX. 55 3 

convincing speech against his restoration ; and when his great captain, with a voice infin- 
itely more powerful with this soldier-hero than the glittering bribes of gold or fame, called 
him to a halt he did not hesitate a moment, but with renewed vigor, with redoubled power, 
urged his convictions upon the Senate. 

When his great commander was for a third time urged by his friends for the candidacy 
by the Republican party for the office of President, and it was apparent to all thinking men 
that it was to be a struggle fierce, full of intense bitterness, Logan went to the front in that 
fight utterly regardless of any effect that it might have upon his own political fortunes. 

I have seen within a few days ago an item floating in the press that in that ever to be 
remembered convention, when it was apparent that Mr. Blaine could not be nominated, 
Senators Hale and Frye visited General Logan and tendered to him the support of their 
friends for the nomination if lie would accept the candidacy. Of course it was a myth. 
Senators Hale and Frye both knew John A. Logan, and had known him for years, and 
even if they had been vested with the authority, which they were not, they never would 
have dreamed of undertaking to bribe him from his allegiance. They knew that no grati- 
fication of personal ambition (and it is the greatest temptation to a man on earth) would 
move him from his allegiance to Grant in that fight any more than a summer breeze would 
stir a mountain from its base. 

Sir, when subsequently Logan himself justly had aspirations for the same nomination I 
sat here in this seat,by the side of that which now is empty, a curious observer, and I dare 
assert that I never saw him trim his sail in the slightest. I never could perceive that the 
fact made any change in his thought or word or vote. 

Mr. President, Logan was a fearlessly honest man. May our dear Lord give him a 
blessed rest and a glorious immortality. [Manifestations of applause in the galleries.] 

SENATOR PRESTON B. PLUMB [REP.], OF KANSAS, SAID : 

Logan has gone from among us to return no more. . . . Yet Logan will not be for- 
gotten. No individual, no association of men is proof against the salutary teachings of ex- 
ample. . . . His zeal was restless, his energy intense, his industry tireless, his intellect 
clear and incisive, his courage unshaken in any and every circumstance, his loyalty to truth 
and duty undoubted, and his fidelity to friendships, in these days of self-seeking, almost 
phenomenal. 

He was a zealous friend and a sturdy opponent. His blows were delivered in honorable 
fashion, and those he received in like manly controversy were accepted in a chivalrous 
spirit. 

It was the crowning felicity of his association with us that, as the most conspicuous of 
our volunteer soldiery during the War of the Rebellion, he became the special champion of 
the interests of not only his immediate comrades in the field, but of all who had helped to 
bear the flag of the Union through trials and discouragement to final victory. With what 
fidelity and energy this sacred trust was discharged, the Senate and the country alike bear 
witness. 

It is given to but few to so happily unite in their own experience heroic martial achieve- 
ments with eminent civic successes. Yet he bore his accumulated honors mildly, and 
delighted more in the calm content of his home and fireside than in the loud acclaim of 
men. 

Logan fought his own way, won his own victories, made his own fame secure. 

Scrutinizing the list of those who, emerging from comparative obscurity, have contrib- 
uted the noblest service to the Republic and made themselves a record for immortality, the 
name of Logan will be found written not far below those of Lincoln and of Grant. 

SENATOR WILLIAM M. EVARTS [REP.], OF NEW YORK, SAID : 

It cannot, I believe, be doubted that at every stage of General Logan's life he 
was a capital figure. 

If in the first few months of the opening struggle, aftef he had taken his position in an- 
imating, arousing, confirming the movement of this people to sustain the Government, if in 
the first battle bullets had taken away his life, Logan would have been a capital figure in 
the memory of that great scene and on that great theatre. If in his military career, com- 
memorated and insisted upon so well, at any pause in his advance he had fallen in this 
battle or that battle, he would have been a capital figure in that scene and on that theatre. 
And at the end of the war, when the roll was made up of the heroes, and had he not moved 
before this great people in any subsequent career, if the angel of death had then taken 
away his life, he would have been a capital figure in the whole honor of that war. 



554 LIFE 0F LOGAN. 

And, Mr. President, in the great civic labors and dangers that attended the rearrange- 
ment of our political and social condition in this country subsequent to the war, if that 
share and if that part of his career had been the only one to be commemorated, he would 
have been a capital figure in that. And if, when these strifes were composed and the country 
was knit together in allegiance and loyalty to the Government he loved and served, he 
thenceforward in this Chamber had presented for the record of his life only what should 
have been manifested and known and observed here, he would have been a capital figure in 
that single scene and theatre. 

We therefore must agree in what in his lifetime and so recently now after his death 
meets a universal concurrence, that he was of the citizen-soldiers of this great nation the 
greatest, and that of that class of citizen-soldiers that were numbered among statesmen he 
was the greatest of statesmen, and we must confess that on this larger area he still remains 
a capital figure which could be missed from no narrative of any portion of the story of his 
life. 

In every form of popular influence on the largest scale, near to the topmost of the cul- 
minating crown of a people's glory to the fame of one of their citizens, he was before us in 
the most recent contest for the Presidency. He, at the moment that he died, was held, in 
the judgment of his countrymen, among the very foremost for the future contest. And this 
illustration of his distinction knows no detraction, no disparagement, no flaw touching the 
very heart and manhood of his life and character. 

The loom of Time is never idle and the busy fingers of the Fates are ever weaving as in a 
tapestry the many threads and colors that make up our several lives, and when these are 
exposed to critics and to admirers there shall be found few of brighter colors or of nobler 
pattern than this life of General Logan. 

SENATOR DWIGHT M. SABIN [REP.J, OF MINNESOTA, SAID : 

Mr. President : . . . This session of the Senate has been dedicated to the offer- 
ing of a tribute to him who but recently sat with us in council, and who, it is entirely within 
the limits of moderation to say, has left a stamp upon the public affairs of our country 
during the period of his life which lime will not efface while the Republic endures. The 
name of General John A. Logan is at once a glory to the American people and a natural 
heritage to future generations. He was a Colossus among the giants of American history. 
The impress of his individuality and genius must remain upon the institutions for the per- 
petuity and perfecting of which the lives of Washington, of Hamilton, of Jefferson, of Sum- 
ner, of Lincoln, and of Grant were dedicated. . . . For over twenty years the untiring 
industry and the genius of General Logan as a statesman is to be found on almost every 
page of the records of the House of Representatives or of this Senate ; and it is a fact per- 
haps not generally known that General Logan originated and introduced more public meas- 
ures than any other member ; and we, his colleagues upon this floor, are familiar with that 
record, which is destined to grow brighter and more legible with the lapse of time. 

More fitting words cannot be said of our dear friend and lamented associate than his 
own touching and eloquent tribute to the memory of the immortal Lincoln : 

Yes, his sun has set forever ; loyalty's gentle voice can no longer wake thrills of joy along the tuneless chords 
of his mouldering heart ; yet patriots and lovers of liberty who still linger on the shoies of time rise and bless 
his memory ; and millions yet unborn will in after-time rise to deplore his death and cherish as a household 
word his deathless name. 

SENATOR THOMAS W. PALMER [REP.], OF MICHIGAN, SAID: 

When the news reached me, many thousand miles from here, that General Logan was 
dead, I felt that something more than a great man had passed away. I felt that a great 
impelling force — a bulwark whose resistance had never been overcome — a cohesive power 
which bound together many atoms which otherwise would have been unrelated had been 
eclipsed. 

Among the many prominent characters that have come before the public gaze in the last 
twenty-live years he can be assigned no secondary place, burn in the then far West, where 
advantages were few, he had developed from within. He had evolved what was involved. 
All that he appeared to be he was. His nature could not tolerate meretricious aids if 
proffered. If he had been caught in the eddies and cyclones of the French Revolution he 
would have been Danton's coadjutor, if not Danton himself; Danton the furious, the gen- 
erous, the unrestrainable, the untamed. His motto would have been, as was that of his 
prototype, to dare, and by that sign he would have saved his country if human power could 



APPENDIX. 555 

have availed. Placed in another environment, inspired by other traditions, his daring was 
none the less conspicuous, and he was none the lessafactor in that memorable conflict which 
unified his native land. 

Born in Switzerland he would have been a Winkelried or an Ilofer, had the exigencies 
of the times demanded. 

If there is to be a type of the Caucasian race to be known distinctively as the American, 
it will have as its substructure spiritually the pronounced traits which have made the name 
of Logan famous — directness of aim, intrepidity of spirit, honesty of purpose, generosity for 
the vanquished, tenderness for the weak, and catholicity of feeling for all. Some of these 
qualities were at times obscured in him because of the intensity of his nature, which sub- 
ordinated all things to the demands of the time and occasion. 

He detested pretence. He denuded shams. He projected himself with such force that 
to me he seemed to have the dual nature of the catapult and the missile which it throws. 

I was thrown with him during the last Presidential contest for a season in my own State. 
The canvass was bitter and exhausting. His capacity for work then illustrated was marvel- 
lous. The methods by which he reached the hearts of the people were spontaneous, subtle, 
and effective. His progress was an ovation. He never appeared without evoking the most 
rapturous applause, and he never disappointed expectation. He carried about him an at- 
mosphere that attracted and cemented men to him. The secret was he was en rapport 
with the heart of humanity. No man so low but felt he was a brother, no man so high but 
felt he was his peer. 

In the Senate he united the valor of the soldier and the temper of the legislator to the 
tenderness of the child with its quick resentments quickly set aside. 

If in another age, under other conditions, he had died like Danton, on a scaffold raised 
by those whom he had helped to save (I can fancy), he would have said, as Danton said to 
his friend when the mob were howling for his biood, " Heed not that vile canaille, my 
friend ; " and again, as he stepped upon the scaffold, " O my wife, my well-beloved ;" and 
I believe the historian would have said of him as of Danton, " No hollow formalist, decep- 
tive and self-deceptive, ghastly to the natural sense, was this ; but a man — with all his 
dross he was a man, fiery real, from the great fire bosom of nature herself." 

If, like Sidney, wounded and dying, he had lain upon the battlefield he would have 
been equal to the re-enactment of the story which has made Sidney's name a sweet savour 
unto Christendom. 

But Providence had reserved him for a kindlier fate. The hand of affection cooled his 
brow, and his eye had lost its speculation and the ear its sensibility before the tears and 
moans of those he loved attested to others that the strong man had at last met a power that 
was silently, speedily, surely bearing him to the dark house and the long sleep. 

Amid the many heroic figures which stand out on the luminous background of the past 
quarter of a century none will be regarded with more affection and interest than that sturdy 
and intrepid form portrayed in silhouette, clear cut and pronounced in its outlines as in its 
mental traits. 

Happy the State which has born such a citizen. Thrice happy the people who, appre- 
ciating his virtues, shall give him a place in the Valhalla of her heroes for the encouragement 
and inspiration of the youth of the future. 

SENATOR CHARLES B. FARWELL [REP. J, OF ILLINOIS, SAID : 

Mr. President : After the many eloquent words which have been said upon this mourn- 
ful occasion, I feel that any word which I could say would be idle and vain. General 
Logan was the bravest of soldiers, an able statesman, and an honest man. No higher trib- 
ute can be paid to man than this, and this is the offering which I bring. The late Presi- 
dent of the United States, General Grant, said to me that he could never forget General 
Logan's great services to his country. In battle always brave, never faltering, always 
ready. He is greatest who serves his country best. And shall we not class him as one of 
these ? 

Mr. President, I second the resolutions of my colleague. 

The resolutions were then agreed to unanimously, and "as a further mark of respect to 
the memory of General Logan" the Senate adjourned. 



556 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



PART II.— HOUSE EULOGIES UPON LOGAN. 

TRIBUTES PAID TO LOGAN'S MEMORY, IN THE U. S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, BY REP 
RESENTATIVES THOMAS, THOMAS H. HENDERSON, M'KINLEY, RANDALL, CANNON, BUT 
TERWORTH, DAVID B. HENDERSON, HOLMAN, SPRINGER, GEORGE E. ADAMS, ROGERS 
ROWELL, DANIEL, M'COMAS, A. J. WEAVER, CUTCHEON, WILSON, RICE, CASWELL 
O'HARA, GOFF, OSBORNE, PAYSON, BRADY, HITT, SYMES, LAWLER, PERKINS, PETTIBONE 
HAYNES, BUCHANAN, J. H. WARD, GALLINGER, PLUMB, JACKSON, AND C. M. ANDERSON 

On February 16, 1887, in the United States House of Representatives, Mr. Thomas 
the Representative from Logan's old Congressional District in Illinois, called up the reso 
lutions of respect for the memory of Logan, passed by the Senate and transmitted to the 
House, and submitted for the consideration of the House the following : 

Resolved, That this House has heard with profound sorrow of the death of John A. Logan, late a Senator 
from the State of Illinois. 

Resolved, That the business of this House be suspended that appropriate honors may be paid to the 
memory of the deceased. 

Resolved, That the Clerk of the House be directed to transmit to the family of the deceased a copy of these 
resolutions. 

Resolved, That as an additional mark of respect to the memory of the deceased this House do now adjourn. 

REPRESENTATIVE JOHN R. THOMAS [REP.], OF ILLINOIS, THEREUPON SAID: 

Mr. Speaker : . . . Logan was a born warrior, full to overflowing with military 
genius, spirit, courage, and dash. His military record in the Mexican War was creditable and 
honorable for one of his years, but it was during the War of the Rebellion that his military 
ardor and genius blazed forth in peerless splendor and glory. As colonel of the Thirty- 
first Illinois Regiment, he was almost worshipped by his officers and men ; as the com- 
mander of a brigade, division, corps, and army, he was the central sun of all his command, 
and stood in their estimation as the invincible commander, the irresistible leader. 

At the battles of Fort Donelson, Champion Hills, Vicksburg, Raymond, Resaca, Kene- 
saw Mountain, Peach Tree Creek, Decatur, Atlanta, and Jonesboro' he led his forces always 
to victory. He was the most magnetic, romantically dashing soldier I ever saw upon the 
battlefield. Who of those who witnessed it can ever forget the picturesque splendor of his 
appearance and bearing as he dashed down the line as the new commander of the Army of 
the Tennessee just after McPherson fell on that terrible 22d day of July, 1864. 

The impetuous Hood had launched his forces upon our lines with the fury and power of 
an Alpine avalanche ; McPherson the chivalrous had fallen ; a half-defined panic seized our 
men, and they began falling back, steadily, almost doggedly, at first ; but with fast-expiring 
courage, and rapidly increasing speed they shrunk before the eager onslaught of the enemy. 
Just then Logan came tearing down the line at full speed. He was superbly mounted upon 
a powerful black stallion, a genuine charger, a war-horse indeed ; his long black hair floated 
out like a banner, his fearless eagle eyes were two flaming orbs, his face was as dark as the 
front of a storm-cloud, and his voice was like the battle-blast of a bugle. Instantly the re- 
treating half panic-stricken soldiers changed front, re-formed their line of battle, fixed bay- 
onets, and followed Logan in an irresistible charge against the enemy, driving them in con- 
fusion from the field. 

At the battle of Raymond it became necessary to change the position of a battery of 
artillery on the field. In moving to the new position the battery had to pass over a portion 
of the field where quite a number of the dead of both armies lay. Logan halted the battery, 
and while in full sight of the enemy and under fire, dismounted, and helped with his own 
hands to tenderly remove the dead bodies, both Federal and Confederate, from the road 
where the cannon had to pass. . . . 

I . igan was a born leader in civil, as well as in military life. As a nisi priits lawyer he 
i in the front rank of the profession, even before he entered Congress the first time. 
1 the Illinois Legislature he was chairman of the Judiciary Committee of the 
I 

In Congress, both in the House and Senate, his position and works have been so impor- 



APPENDIX. 557 

tant and conspicuous for almost a quarter of a century that the country and the whole civil- 
ized world must be familiar with them. 

Few men have held so many hearts in the hollow of their hand as did John A. Logan. 
He was the most conspicuous political figure in the West, if not in the country ; and in Illi- 
nois the vacancy caused by his death can never be filled. 

REPRESENTATIVE THOMAS J. HENDERSON [REP.], OF ILLINOIS, SAID: 

Mr. Speaker : . . . My first acquaintance with John A. Logan began in 1840, 
when we were yet but boys. His father, Dr. John Logan, whom I well remember, and 
mine, were in that year members of our State Legislature, and we accompanied them to 
Springfield, the the.n new capital of our State, where we first met and formed an acquaint- 
ance which a little later became intimate, and finally ripened into a friendship which con- 
tinued uninterrupted and unbroken to the day of his death. 

In 1853 he must have been, if not the youngest, among the youngest members of the 
State Legislature, and yet he was a leading, prominent member of the House of Representa- 
tives ; took an active part in all the proceedings, and exhibited at that early day the same 
characteristics which in the last twenty-six or seven years of his life made him one among 
the most conspicuous figures in our national affairs ; that is, he was earnest, enthusiastic, 
fearless. He had opinions and the courage of his convictions, and he maintained them 
with an ability which 1 know made his then political friends regard him as one of the most 
promising young men of the State. 

Logan was a member of the Thirty-sixth and also of the Thirty-seventh Congress. But 
in 1861, before the expiration of his second term, he resigned his seat in Congress, went 
home to Illinois, raised a regiment, and entered into the military service of his country for 
the preservation of the Union. He served in the Thirty-sixth and in the Thirty-seventh 
Congress with ability and distinction. 

I shall not attempt on this occasion to follow General Logan at length in all his brilliant 
and wonderful career after he entered the Union Army in 1861. Nor is it necessary for me 
to do so, for his military service at least is well known to all persons who admire great 
deeds and love and honor the glory of their countrymen. The story of the many memorable 
inarches, battles, and campaigns in which Logan participated and won a glorious distinction 
and a name that will live forever, fills the brightest pages of 1 is country's history, and will 
be repeated by the children of the Republic, I trust, when all who now live shall have 
passed away. . . . Everywhere, wherever this brave, gallant, patriotic soldier went at the 
head of his command, he upheld and defended the flag of his country, with a heroism and 
a patriotism absolutely sublime. 

But it is not for the military service of General Logan alone, glorious as that has been, 
that we should honor his name. I have spoken of his service in civil life before the war. 
But since the war he has represented the State of Illinois in Congress, either as a member 
of the House or the Senate, continuously from 1S66 to the day of his death, with an inter- 
mission of two years, and always with great ability and fidelity. No man has ever been 
more faithful to public duly than John A. Logan. He has been true to every trust confided 
to him, and is entitled to quite as much distinction for his energy and industry, his integrity 
and ability in the councils of the nation since the war as he was for his heroic courage, his 
gallantry, and his patriotism in the military service during the war. John A. Logan was 
one of the most untiring, energetic, industrious, fearless men I have ever known in public 
life. I have often wondered how he accomplished so much work as he did, for but few, if 
any, of our public men have taken a more active part in all our important national legisla- 
tion in the last twenty years than Logan. 

But he has left us. This man of wonderful activity, of untiring energy and industry, of 
earnest patriotism, of heroic courage and distinguished ability — this illustrious citizen, sol- 
dier, and Senator has gone out from among us to return no more forever. He has left us, 
as many of us who knew him best and loved him most believed, before he had reached the 
zenith of his usefulness, and when we hoped higher honors were yet in store for him. 

Mr. Speaker, I stood at the bedside of John A. Logan when he was dying, and saw him 
pass peacefully away. And the scene, one of the most affecting and I may say deeply dis- 
tressing I ever witnessed, can never be obliterated from my memory. . . . General 
Logan has been greatly beloved and honored by the State of Illinois, and in return he has 
shed honor and renown upon the State by faithful and honorable service, and by the lustre 
of his great deeds. And to-day we deplore his death and mourn his loss as a calamity to 
the State and to the entire country. But he leaves behind him a brilliant record, a noble 
example, and a name and a fame which will live forever. 



553 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



REPRESENTATIVE WILLIAM M'KINLEY, JR. [REP.], OF OHIO, SAID : 

Mr. Speaker : . . . General Logan was a conspicuous figure in war, and scarcely 
less conspicuous in peace. Whether on the field of arms or in the forum where ideas clash, 
General Logan was ever at the front. 

Great ami commanding, however, Mr. Speaker, as were his services in war . . . his 
patriotic words penetrated the hearts and the homes of the people of twenty-two States. 
They increased enlistment. They swelled the muster-rolls of States. They moved the 
indifferent to prompt action. They drew the doubting into the ranks of the country's de- 
fenders. 

His first election to Congress was in the year made memorable by the debate between 
Lincoln and Douglas. In the Presidential contest of i860 following he was the enthusiastic 
friend and supporter of Douglas. But the moment secession was initiated and the Union 
threatened he was among the first to tender his sword and his services to Abraham Lincoln, 
and to throw the weight of his great character and resolute soul on the side represented by 
the political rival of his old friend. 

His service in this House and in the Senate, almost uninterruptedly since 1867, was 
marked by great industry, by rugged honesty, by devotion to the interests of the country, 
to the rights of the citizen, and especially by a devotion to the interests of his late comrades- 
in-arms. 

He was a strong and forcible debater. He was a most thorough master of the subjects 
he discussed, and an intense believer in the policy and principles he advocated. In popu- 
lar discussion upon the hustings he had no superiors, and but few equals. He seized the 
hearts and the consciences of men, and moved great multitudes with that fury of enthusiasm 
with which he had moved his soldiers in the field. 

Mr. President, it is high tribute to any man, it is high tribute to John A. Logan, to say 
that in the House of Representatives where sat Thaddeus Stevens, Robert C. Schenck, 
James G. Blaine, and James A. Garfield, Henry Winter Davis, and William D. Kelley, he 
stood equal in favor and in power in party control. And it is equally high tribute to him 
to say that in the Senate of the United States, where sat Charles Sumner and Oliver P. 
Morton, Hannibal Hamlin and Zachariah Chandler, John Sherman and George F. Ed- 
munds, Roscoe Conkling and Justin Morrill, he fairly divided with them the power ami 
responsibility of Republican leadership. No higher eulcgy can be given to any man, no 
more honorable distinction could be coveted. 

It has been said here to-day, Mr. Speaker, that John A. Logan was a partisan, that he 
was a party man. So he was. He believed in the Republican Party ; but while he believed 
in the Republican Party, its purposes and aspirations, he was no blind follower of party cau- 
cuses or of partisan administrations. . . . He was not only quick to defend Charles 
Sumner, but he was as prompt to defend his old comrade and leader, General Grant, when 
a little later he was unjustly (as Logan believed) attacked in the Senate, and the warp and 
woof of the thought of his defence, both of Sumner and of Grant, is exactly the same. He 
puts the defence of both upon the ground of what they have done for their country. . . . 

General Logan's military career, standing alone, would have given him a high place in 
history and a secure one in the hearts of his countrymen. General Logan's legislative career, 
standing alone, would have given 1dm an enduring reputation, associating his name with 
some of the most important legislation of the time and the century. But united, they pre- 
sent a combination of forces and of qualities, they present a success in both careers almost 
unrivalled in the history of men. He lived during a period of very great activities and 
forces, and he impressed himself upon his age and time. To me the dominant and con- 
trolling force in his life was his intense patriotism. 

It stamped all of his acts and utterances and was the chief inspiration of the great work 
he wrought. His book, recently published, is a masterful appeal to the patriotism of the 
pe 'pie. His death, so sudden and unlooked for, was a shock to Ids countrymen and 
1 aused universal sorrow among all classes in every part of the Union. 

He was the idol of the army in which he served — the ideal citizen volunteer of the Re- 
public, the pride of all the armies, and affectionately beloved by all who loved the Union. 

Mr. Speaker, the old soldiers will miss him. The old oak around whom their hearts 
were twined, to which their hopes clung, lias fallen. The old veterans have lost their 
ly friend. The Congress of the United States has lost one of its ablest councillors, the 
Republican Party one of its confessed leaders, the country one of its noble defenders. 



APPENDIX. 5 c 9 

REPRESENTATIVE SAMUEL J. RANDALL [DEM.], OK PENNSYLVANIA, SAID : 

Mr. Speaker, I sincerely sympathize with the State of Illinois and the entire country 
in the loss to the public councils of General John A. Logan, whose valor and skill upon the 
battle-field were supplemented and rounded out by a career of great usefulness in the House 
of Representatives and in the Senate of the United States. 

He was a child of the people, and he received at their hands almost every honor that 
could be appropriately bestowed. He was a fair and complete illustration of the justice and 
the resulting strength of our form of government, in this, that it gives to the worthy and in- 
dustrious citizen an opportunity to reach the highest positions known to the laws. 

The records of our public men are the indications of the destiny of our country, either 
for weal or woe. They represent the moral height to which the people grew in their time. 
They are examples for the study of the generations which are to follow them. 

Therefore, when a man like John A. Logan passes off the scene, it is our grateful duty 
to recall every act of his which, whether in the field or in the forum, was characterized by 
deep conviction and by undoubted moral and personal courage. 

The full story of his life will be told in truthful and loving words by the members of the 
Illinois delegation and by his political friends on this floor ; but I cannot refrain from ex- 
pressing this brief tribute of my respect to the memory of a public man who deserved so 
well of his country. 

REPRESENTATIVE JOSEPH G. CANNON [REP.], OF ILLINOIS, SAID : 

Mr. Speaker, whoever pays a proper tribute to the memory of General Logan must write 
the history of the country during the late war and the years succeeding. 

With Lincoln, Grant, Sherman, and Thomas he was a factor — and not the least — in the 
settlement of these questions which determine the fate of a nation, ay, of a civiliza- 
tion. 

The greatest popular leader in the ranks of the Democratic party for a generation imme- 
diately preceding the war was Stephen A. Douglas. Logan was his admirer, supporter, and 
trusted friend. . . . When Douglas died Logan took his place as a leader, entered 
the army, and did not lay down his arms until the war closed. At the commencement of 
the war, through the efforts of Douglas and Logan, the North was saved from the ravages 
of civil warfare within its borders. 

Logan is universally acknowledged to have been the greatest volunteer general of the late 
war. In effectiveness of service to the Republic history will accord him an equal meed of 
praise with any officer, either regular or volunteer, in the late war. 

Logan not only proved a great general in the field, but by placing his fingers upon his 
own pulse was enabled to count the heart-beats of the whole people. The people recog- 
nized that he was one of them. They gave him their confidence ; to confidence they added 
respect, and to respect love. These he retained until his death. He was a friend of the 
people, and the people were his friends. 

His death is the nation's loss. His record is the nation's inheritance. He moulded 
events in great crises. His achievements are examples of the value of ability when coupled 
with convictions. Whatever he did he did with all his might. His life will be a healthy 
incentive to action to the millions who are to follow after him. Logan dead will be a potent 
factor for good when those people who drift without convictions, priding themselves upon 
their culture in lieu thereof, are dead and forgotten. 

REPRESENTATIVE BENJAMIN BUTTERWORTH [REP. J, OF OHIO, SAID: 

Mr. Speaker, . . . John A. Logan sleeps with his fathers. The final audit of his 
life's account has been made up. 

What made this man a leader of men ? What gave him influential prominence through- 
out the country? It was, I submit, due in the main to the inherent qualities of heart he 
possessed ; his uncompromising devotion to what he conceived to be duty. With him, be- 
tween right and wrong there was no middle ground. Between right and wrong there could 
not consistently with the high obligations of duty be any compromise. In him there was 
found coupled with the unselfish and unequalled zeal of a Covenanter Calvinist, if you 
please, the chivalric bearing of a Cavalier. 

He was of the material of which martyrs are made. If a sense of duty required, he 
would have suffered at the stake with John Rogers. And by the same token he might not 
have been seriously troubled at the taking off of Servetus. John A. Logan's highest ambi- 
tion was to be right. 



5 6 ° 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



Up to i86r he was a Democrat in the strictest partisan sense. The Democratic Party 
was the agency through which all great good to our country was to be worRed out. The 
party horizon came down all around him — he could not or did not appear to see beyond it. 
Then came a time when that too narrow range of vision was extended. The veil that ob- 
scured the more enlarged view of portentous events was lifted by the conflict of 1861. 

Logan stood for the first time to contemplate what stubborn adherence to party lines 
meant. He saw portending in the near future a Constitution overthrown and defied, the 
Union dismembered, a Government disrupted and destroyed. From that moment love of 
party was swallowed up in love of country. His duty to him at least was clear. The integ- 
rity of the Union, the supremacy of the Constitution, the acknowledged sovereignty of the 
flag wok.- henceforth to him above all else. With what uncompromising zeal, unselfish de- 
votion, and undaunted heroism he served the cause of his country in the field and in the 
councils of the nation is known to all his countrymen. . . . 

The Calvinistic faith of his mother, the stern integrity of his father, blending in the son 
fitted him for a leader, and made him a man whose influence could not but be healthful. 
He would have been Moreau at Hohenlinden, but was incapable of being Moreau at Dres- 
den, lie would have led at Malvern Hill, and marched toward the sound of the cannon 
and the rising dust of battle at Bull Run. He was ambitious to be President, but in the 
pursuit of that worthy ambition he never practised the small arts of the demagogue nor re- 
sorted to the tricks which mere political expediency suggest. . . 

These, in my judgment, are the crowning glories of Logan's character : That in all his 
course he sought " to walk in the light." Inflexible adherence to duty, as that duty was 
revealed to him. Incorruptible integrity in every field of action, and in every employment. 
Unselfish devotion to country and friends. These attributes of his character shine more re- 
splendent now that he walks no more among us. . . . 

REPRESENTATIVE DAVID B. HENDERSON [REP.], OF IOWA, SAID : 

Mr. Speaker : The nation lingers by the grave of Logan ! . . . Weeks have passed 
since the bells of the nation tolled him to rest, and yet the people remain uncovered. It is 
no common man whose fall shocks sixty millions of people. I come to the sad duty of this 
hour not to speak for others, but 'to render the heart-offerings of a comrade and a friend. 

We first naturally think of General Logan as a soldier. So strong was he at every post 
of duty that history must hesitate to pronounce upon him as the greater soldier or the 
greater statesman. Though not trained to arms, he was a great soldier. The volunteers 
with one voice claim this. The leading generals of the country, those schooled for war, 
admit it. He fought as one who ever kept in mind the great cause that called him to the 
field. If true of any man, it can be said that danger and death had no terrors for Logan. 
Restless when the enemy was afar, he became eager and fired by the approach of battle and 
a consuming whirlwind when the charge was sounded. His presence drove fear from the 
hearts of the soldiery. He was inspiring, fearless, conquering. The tumult of battle and 
the roar of cannon made him the imperial personification of a great fighter. In thinking 
of Logan as a soldier, forget not his greatest attribute. Not for ambition did he draw his 
sw nd. I nit fur his country and all his countrymen. 

Put few men combine the qualities of a great soldier and a great statesman — Logan was 
both. The courage and wisdom needed for a great statesman are of a higher order than the 
courage and wisdom needed by a great commander. It requires a higher, mightier courage 
to face and control a sweeping Niagara of popular thought than it does to face death or 
command an" army of men. Logan was one of the few men of his time who combined both 
itials for these high trusts. Most statesmen, like some generals, follow their forces. 
The great statesman, like the great general, must lead. On any field Logan was " a born 
1 of men." On both fields he kept close to the people. . . . 

He was a man of the people in an eminent degree. His devotion to them was as sincere 
as was their love for him. . . . Seldom did" wealth support the career of Logan. It 
was the pe 'pie who followed him from obscurity to the Senate. Bui few men come out of 
cruel, searching conflict of a national campaign stronger than when they enter it. 
• his John A. Logan did in 1S84. When nominated, his party knew him to be strong with 
the people, but the great strength and popularity that he developed was a surprise "to his 
party. In the moment of his defeat he was greater than he who wore "the" laurel. Il 
w fs in the country ;it large as in my own State in 18S4. His passage through Iowa was a 
triumphal march, ami his pathway could be traced by the surging, shouting masses of the 
people. The historians will tell of General Logan and of Senator Logan, but the living will 



APPENDIX. 



56l 



remember him as the " Black Eagle," "Black Jack," and "Honest John." He was an 
open, honest, brave, powerful tribune of the people. He was one of the great commoners 
of his time. 

As a powerful, kind, untiring friend of his old comrades he had no equal, and no man 
can wear his mantle. You need not seek a burial-spot for John A. Logan. He is buried 
in and cannot be removed from the warm, loving hearts of his old comrades in arms. 

REPRESENTATIVE WILLIAM S. HOLMAM [DEM.], OF INDIANA, SAID : 

Mr. Speaker, the pen of history can only do justice to so great a record as that which 
John A. Logan has bequeathed to his country. We can pay on an occasion like this only a 
brief tribute to his memory. 

John A. Logan came into this Hall as a member of the House at one of the most 
anxious periods of our history, the beginning of the Thirty-sixth Congress. While not 
taking an active part in current business of the House, he displayed from the beginning 
qualities and powers that gave promise of the great career in civil and military life which he 
was destined to complete. The State of Illinois was then represented in the House and 
Senate by an unusually able body of men. Stephen A. Douglas and Lyman Trumbull 
were Senators ; Washburne, afterward so distinguished in this House and later as our min- 
ister to France during the war between France and Germany ; Lovejoy, the greatest of the 
anti-slavery leaders ; Farnsworth, Fouke, Kellogg, McClernand, Morris, and Robinson, of 
the Northwest, were the colleagues in the House, of John A. Logan — a very strong body of 
men. All of them were either then men of national reputation or afterward achieved dis- 
tinction in civil or military life. McClernand, Farnsworth, and Fouke won distinction in 
the Union army ; and yet with such colleagues John A. Logan was a striking and promi- 
nent feature of the House from the time he took the seat where my friend [Mr. Eden] now 
sits. His manly deportment, the fire and vigor of his occasional remarks, the resoluteness 
of his purpose as expressed in every gesture of his hand and tone of voice, commanded at- 
tention and gave promise of a great career if the occasion should arise, and of honorable 
distinction under any conditions of human life. 

He was the highest type of a strong, positive, rugged, fearless man, whose opinions, 
were absolute convictions, controlling and mastering. As a politician and partisan he 
neither gave nor asked quarter. 

He never hesitated in the expression of his opinions, and they were not modified during 
his service in the Thirty-sixth Congress or the short called session of the Thirty-seventh 
Congress, which met on the 4th day of July, 1S61. . . . He would have preserved the • 
Union by compromise, by concessions. . . . But I am satisfied that General Logan did 
not at any time hesitate in his devotion to the Union, hostile as he was to the principles of" 
the great party which obtained control of the Government in i860. No matter what party 
was in power, he was for the Union. 

When he became convinced that the Union could not be restored with African slavery, 
that its continued existence would be ultimately fatal to our free institutions, he freely 
avowed his opinions. . . . General Logan was a man in many respects of the same 
type with Mr. Douglas ; both were devoted friends of their country, firm, confident, and 
fearless when war was inevitable ; the declaration of Mr. Douglas of his purpose to stand 
by the Union at every hazard thrilled the country and animated his friends. General Logan 
and most of his immediate associates adopted at an early moment the same patriotic pol- 
icy. 

There were qualities of greatness about General Logan that necessarily made him a great 
character in our history. The rugged, fearless positiveness of his character, his indomita- 
ble strength of will, his manly integrity, made him a great man. He had the qualities that 
gather large bodies of men around men. His friendships were strong and warm. He did 
not shrink from his enemies. No man ever had more devoted friends, or those who would 
make greater sacrifices to advance his interests. 

In the judgment of the present generation General Logan has made a great record both 
in civil and military life, in statesmanship as well as in the field ; that judgment, we may con- 
fidently believe, will be confirmed by impartial history. He will occupy a large space in 
the history of our country. To the generations that are coming he will be a grand type of 
American manhood. His name, a synonym of patriotism and honor — 

One of the few. the immortal names, 
That were not bjrn to die. 

36 



562 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



RErRESENTATIVE WILLIAM M. SPRINGER [DEM.J, OF ILLINOIS, SAIO 

Mr. Speaker : In the language of the resolution now pending the ordinary business of 
legislation is suspended that the friends and associates of the deceased Senator, John A. 
Lo^an, may pay fitting tribute to his public and private virtues. . . . 

I saw him for the first time in January, 1857, just thirty years ago. He was then a 
member of the House of Representatives of the State of Illinois, and I was a student at Illi- 
nois College, at Jacksonville. I had visited Springfield to witness the inauguration of Gov- 
ernor William II. Bissell. When I entered the legislative hall, the youthful and impetuous 
Logan was speaking. He at once arrested my attention. I have never forgotten the scene. 
There was great interest manifested, and party spirit ran high. He seemed to move upon 
his political foes as if charging an enemy upon a field of battle. His speech occupied two 
days in delivery, and in severity of language and vehemence of manner excelled, perhaps, 
all other off >rts of his life. He was one of the leaders of the Democratic party in the Leg- 
islature and had been selected by his friends as the orator for the occasion. 

Governor Bissell had been a prominent Democrat, but had differed with his party on the 
Kansas and Nebraska bills, and became the candidate of the Republicans for governor, and 
was elected. He was a man of great ability, and his candidacy had resulted in a political 
campaign of unprecedented acrimony and bitter invectives. The heated discussions before 
the people were carried into the Legislature. When the motion was made to print 20,000 
copies of Governor Bissell' s message, Logan moved to amend so as to provide for printing 
but half the usual number. The debate lasted more than a week, and was one of the most 
memorable ever witnessed in the State, which is noted for great political contests. 

The body was Democratic, and Logan's motion prevailed. From that time forward his 
reputation as a party leader was established. During the thirty years which have elapsed 
he has occupied a prominent position in State and National affairs. He passed at once from 
the arena of State politics to the councils of the nation. ... He resigned his scat in 
Congress in 1861, and entered the army as colonel of an Illinois regiment. 

By regular promotions for gallant and meritorious conduct he reached the rank of major- 
general. His military record is one of the most brilliant of the late war. Had he been 
educated at West Point and thus relieved from the prejudice which existed in the regular 
army against volunteer generals, there is little doubt that he would have risen to the chief 
command of the army. 

When General Sherman denied him the command of the Army of the Tennessee before 
Atlanta, a position which his skill and bravery had won for him, he cheerfully submitted 
and urged his friends to make no complaints or protests. I cannot follow him in all his 
battles during the long and eventful war. Suffice it to say that he shrank from no hard- 
ship, he feared no danger, he faltered in nothing. Beloved by his men, and respected by 
his fellow-officers, he won the admiration of the people, and his memory will be cherished 
by his countrymen for all time to come. . . . 

After the close of the war he was again re-elected as a Representative in Congress, serv- 
ing in the Fortieth and Forty-first Congresses. He was three times elected a United States 
Senator from the State of Illinois, and had served not quite two years of his last term when 
he died. His career as a statesman is scarcely less brilliant than that as a soldier. . . . 

The soldiers of the late war had in Senator Logan a most faithful and devoted friend. 
They never appealed to him in vain. They seemed to look to him for all general and spe- 
cial legislation in their behalf. In his death they lost their ablest advocate and truest 
friend. ... 

Mr. Speaker, nothing can be said to add to the fame or greatness of our departed friend. 
His work is done. His race is run. He sleeps the sleep that knows no waking. But his 
deeds shall live after him. Adown the pathway of time coming generations will read of his 
deeds of courage, of his devotion to the public weal, of his love for his mother, his wife, 
his children, and country, and wonder as the years glide by whether they will ever behold 
his like again. 

REPRESENTATIVE GEORGE E. ADAMS [REP.], OF ILLINOIS, SAID: 

Mr. SPEAKER : . . . Logan will be regarded as the most striking figure of our civil 
war. He was the greatest of the Union volunteers. As such he will stand in history. 
Macaulay, speaking of the famous army of the Long Parliament, says : 

These persons, sober, moral, diligent, and accustomed to reflect, had been induced to take up arms, not by 
the pi '• not by the love oi novelty and license, not by the arts of recruit ins oftVers, but by religious 

and political zeal, mingled vwih the desire uf distinction and promotion. The boast of the soldiers was, as we 



APPENDIX. 



563 



find it recorded in their solemn resolutions, that they had not been forced into the service, nor had enlisted 
chiefly for the sake of lucre ; that they were no janizaries, but free born Englishmen, who had, of their own ac- 
cord, put their lives in jeopardy for the liberty and religion of England, and whose right and duty it was to watch 
over the welfare of the nation which they had saved. 

Such, in the main, were the volunteers of our civil war, and such, in a high degree, were 
the regiments of the Northwestern States, who made up the famous Fifteenth Corps. They 
were more effective, perhaps, as a military force under the command of Logan than they 
would have been under a merely professional soldier. They recognized in him not merely an 
accomplished commander, but a fellow-citizen and a friend, whose hopes, feelings, and pur- 
poses accorded with their own. As they knew that he would spare neither them nor himself 
in the service of the Union, so they knew that he would expose them to no unnecessary danger, 
or sacrifice their lives to his own military ambition. Therefore it was that after his troops 
had come to understand his character as a commander, a regiment under his lead seemed 
sometimes to become a brigade, a brigade seemed to have the strength of a division, and 
wheresoever Logan thought it his duty to lead, fifteen thousand thinking bayonets were 
ready to follow. 

History will take no leaf from the laurels which Logan won in the civil war, because he 
was reluctant to believe that civil war was necessary. . . . But the time came when 
Logan's attitude toward the administration of Mr. Lincoln and his war policy changed as if 
in the twinkling of an eye. It was by no elaborate course of reasoning ; it was by a sudden 
flash of insight that he saw that the war was inevitable, and that the North was resolved. 
He saw, he understood, he obeyed, as unhesitatingly as did the apostle to the Gentiles 
when he beheld the great light that shone on the way to Damascus and heard the voice 
crying " Saul ! Saul!" . . . He saw his own duty also. He could thank God, as 
Wendell Phillips had, for every word he had spoken counselling peace, but his heart told 
him that henceforth the only place of honor and duty for him, the only place where his 
spirit could be at peace with itself, would be in the camp, or on the march, or in the line of 
battle with the volunteers of Illinois. . . . 

He went into his district. He made as brave a charge upon the prejudices of Southern 
Illinois as he ever made upon the Confederate lines. He made his people see what he had 
seen on that July morning in Washington, that the safety of the great Republic, the freedom 
and happiness of millions yet unborn, in the South as well as in the North, must be sought 
by the dreadful path of civil war. Thus the first service which Logan rendered in the 
war for the Union was a victory won by his eloquent tongue before he had drawn his 
sword. 

I shall not try to recount Logan's military services in the Union cause during the next 
four years. There are many others in this House more competent than I to recall the his- 
tory of these stirring events, of which they were themselves a part. 

One trait of Logan's character has attracted the attention of all who met him in public 
or private life. He was a sincere and devoted friend of his friends, and he was not the 
secret enemy of any man. Open, straightforward sincerity in word and action was such a 
prominent characteristic of his demeanor toward friend and enemy alike that we may not 
unfairly apply to him the description which Clarendon gives of the great Duke of Bucking- 
ham : 

His kindness and affection to his friends was so vehement that it was as so many marriages for better and 
worse, and so many leagues offensive and defensive, as if he thought himself obliged to love all his friends and 
to make war upon all they were angry with, let the cause be what it would. And it cannot be denied that he 
was an enemy in the s.ime excess, and prosecuted those he looked upon as his enemies with the utmost rigor 
and animosity, and was not easily induced to a reconciliation. And yet there are some examples of his reced- 
ing in that particular And in the highest passion he was so far from stooping to any dissimulation whereby his 
displeasure might be concealed and covered till he had attained his revenge (the low method of courts), that he 
never endeavored to do any man an ill office before he first told him what he was to expect from him, and re- 
proached him with the injuries he had done, with so much generosity, that the person found it in his power to 
receive further satisiaction in the way he would choose for himself. 

When a great man dies in the maturity of his intellectual powers, before he has even 
reached the threshold of old age, we are apt to deplore not merely our loss, but his own. 
. . . Logan's death is our loss rather than his own. Better, perhaps, for this keen, 
ambitious spirit to pass from life in the full maturity of his mental powers ; his career not 
yet completed ; the last and brightest goal of his ambition still before his eyes and almost 
within his reach. 



564 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



REPRESENTATIVE JOHN H. ROGERS [DEM.], OF ARKANSAS, SAID: 



Mr. Speaker, integrity is the basic principle of all moral character — integrity in its 
Ii a> lest sense, integrity of thought, integrity of word, integrity of deed. Laborious indus- 
try is the indispensable condition of all success which is honestly achieved. No less an im- 
portant element in human greatness is courage. 

My personal relations with General Logan were limited to a passing acquaintance and a 
few meetings on matters of public business. But I am persuaded from all 1 knew of him 
that he possessed all the qualities I have mentioned and to a pre-eminent degree. 

At a time when others holding similar positions of honor and trust lived sumptuously 
and grew rich General Logan kept his frugal and simple ways, and finally died compara- 
tively poor. 

That he was indefatigably industrious, zealous, and scrupulously faithful in the discharge 
of every public duty those who knew him best cheerfully attest, and this I believe to have 
been the key to his great success. 

Few men are born great. The truest, the safest, the wisest are the plodders. I do 
not believe General Logan was either brilliant or in any sense what the world calls a 
genius. But he was more ; he was a great worker, an honest thinker, and a courageous 
actor. 

He was by nature self-reliant, but circumstances had wrought no small work in the for- 
mation of his character. He had grown up and lived his whole life in the great West. 
That great section of our country gives to history no better specimen of its pro- 
ductions than General Logan. Open, frank, without finesse, his methods were direct, and 
his purposes unconcealed. He was ambitious, but it was a laudable ambition guided by 
patriotism and inspired by a desire to benefit his fellow-men and promote the welfare of his 
country. 

I have ventured to speak only of his personal characteristics and his private and public 
worth. All understand his public services, extending through a long, eventful, and honor- 
able public life. These belong to history and are the proud heritage of his country which 
he served and honored and which in turn honored him. 

It is difficult to determine whether his greatest achievements were in war or in peace. 
They were great in both. His long and honorable career is a tribute to our institutions and 
an honor to our marvellous civilization. His life furnishes a bright example for the ambi- 
tious youth of the Republic. He went out from among us in the prime of his usefulness 
and in the zenith of his influence and power. 

In the great State of Illinois his place will not be easily filled. In the councils of his 
party he will be missed. In the Senate of the United States he will be long remembered. 
In the hearts of the citizen soldiery of the Union he is already enshrined. 

Mr. Speaker, I esteem it a privilege, as a pleasure, to unite in paying this last tribute of 
respect to his memory. 

REPRESENTATIVE JONATHAN H. ROWELL [REP.], OF ILLINOIS, SAID : 

Mr. Speaker, with no hope of adding anything to what has already been said in the 
way of correctly delineating the character of General Logan, I am still unwilling to let this 
occasion pass without paying my tribute to his memory. It was my fortune to serve under 
him during the War of the Rebellion for more than a year, and in the same army — the Army 
of the Tennessee — for a much longer period. 

Since the return of peace I have been one of those who believed in him as a political leader 
— as safe in council as he was heroic in war. . . . I have felt that the annals of Illinois and 
her connection with the grandest and saddest periods of our national history would not be 
complete until the greatest of our volunteer soldiers should be called to the chief magistracy 
of the nation, and so complete in that great office the triumvirate, Lincoln, Grant, Logan — 
each with his own peculiar greatness — Illinois' contribution to the world's great names 
" that were not born to die." It has seemed to me that the grand army of volunteers would 
never be fully honored and rewarded until the whole nation should do them homage by elect- 
ing to the Presidency their recognized chieftain. But Providence has ordered otherwise, and 
we bow in humble submission, still protesting that one page of our history remains incom- 
plete and must ever so remain. 

The death of General Logan is especially mourned by Western soldiers. The young 
men of the great West who sprung to arms at the first note of impending war formed the 
nucleus of that great division of the Army known as " the Army of the Tennessee." That 
army was almost exclusively composed of the men of '61 and '62 from the West and North- 



APPENDIX. 



565 



west. It was the army that won the victories which made Grant commander-in-chief and 
Sherman his chief lieutenant. With that army the knightly McPherson won his triumphs 
and rode to his death. With that army was all of General Logan's service from tlie lie- 
ginning to the end of the war. The injustice which kept him from being its commander 
after McPherson fell gave him also the opportunity of showing to the country how great he 
could be in unselfish patriotism. At Belmont and at Fort Donelson he gave token of the 
future great commander. But it was in that remarkable campaign in the rear of Vicksburg, 
when Grant cut loose from his base, and by a series of brilliant battles and victories, equal 
to any Napoleon ever won, forced Pemberton within the works at Vicksburg and finally 
compelled his surrender, that General Logan became the idol of his men and proved himself 
worthy to stand with Sherman and McPherson, safe on any field and equal to great occa- 
sions. Thenceforth where Logan led, his soldiers followed with implicit faith. Remember- 
ing Raymond and Champion Hills, from that time on they followed Logan into battle with 
full faith in a victorious ending. The war over, he remained their leader still. I speak as 
a member of that old Army of the Tennessee — glorying in its volunteer hero ; rejoicing in 
all his successes in the field, at home, in this House, and in yonder Senate Chamber ; mourn- 
ing Iris too early death. 

Pure in public and private life, honest in thought as well as deed, he has left to mankind 
an example worthy of emulation ; to the nation, his untarnished name and fame — the best 
of legacies. 

REPRESENTATIVE JOHN W. DANIEL [DEM.], OF VIRGINIA, SAID : 

Mr. Speaker, in the full vigor of his life, in the rounded fame of achievement, and in 
the high career of his distinguished office John A. Logan has heard the Master's call. . . . 

As said of him in the Senate Chamber by one who confronted him in the first and last 
battle which he fought, he was marked by "grand individuality and striking characteristics." 
And by another not less His opponent in the forum and the field : " No braver man ever 
lived, and the Almighty Creator endowed him with many other and great virtues." 

No glint is given us in these words alone of his long, varied, and brilliant services ; but 
they constitute an epitaph chiselled by the hand of truth upon the marble tablet of enduring 
memory, and they will live as the unaffected tribute of sterling men to one who was himself 
a sterling man and leader of men. 

The reason that Logan's name is so universally honored lies in the fact that he lived his 
life in the light, and had no cause to fear the light. In his character and in his record there 
are no dark mysterious phases. In an era fertile in the production of distinguished men, 
and that brought men to the front according to the strength that was in them, he stands 
upon a pedestal high and erect, a clear-cut, magnificent individuality, purely American in its 
type, heroic in its mould, marked by the masculine lines of power in thought and power in 
action, bespeaking the will to do, eloquent of the soul to dare. 

Did he accomplish much? Yes ; he possessed a robust mind, he knew that a straight 
line was the shortest distance between two points, and he went that line, " horse, foot, and 
dragoons," from purpose to object. He was a tireless worker, difficulties and dangers did 
not deter him, and he has left behind him lasting memorials of his work with sword and 
tongue and pen. 

Was he a great orator ? Yes ; not in the grace of classic art, not in the polish of 
rounded period, but in the earnestness of his utterances, the cogency of his thought, and in 
the power to persuade. 

Was he a great soldier ? Yes ; great in the personal prowess of the brave knight who 
faces those not less brave with valor that does not hesitate or flinch from the encounter, and 
great in abilities to inspire, marshal, and lead hosts to battle. 

Was lie beloved by his soldiers ? Yes ; he was thoughtful of them, he was reckless of 
himself, and he fought in front of them. 

Was he a great political leader ? Yes ; he believed in his own side, and espoused it with 
enthusiasm ; he stood up to it with fidelity whether it won or lost ; he never took two sides 
at thesametime, or wabbled between them ; he was strong in council ; steady in the conflict, 
and powerful before the people. 

Was he respected by his opponents ? Yes ; even though they thought that he was severe 
in his judgments and bitter in his expressions, they sincerely respected him, because they 
realized that in him was the upright, fearless spirit that said its say and did its deed, and left 
to God the consequence. They respected him because he was candid and outspoken, and did 
not wreathe his sword in myrtle-boughs. They respected him because they knew he did not 
carry political hostility into private relations ; because he was often kind and generous to 



5 66 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



his political opponents, as I personally know and am pleased to testify, and because he never 
prostituted his public place to private gain. 

So high is honesty among the virtues that it condones all errors of judgment. So splen- 
did is courage that when it stands by honor's side it makes the man seem godlike. 

The man who has been laid by loving hands to his final rest was honest and he was brave, 
and mankind will honor his name and memory. . . 

With humble spirit I commune with you to-day who pronounce blessings upon the dust 
of him who was a chief among your chieftains, and who won by his valorous hand and up- 
right heart the honors paid him by the people. 

If errors he committed, may the good God forgive them. His virtues they were many 
and they were great. May they live forever, the well-spring of pride and inspiration to all 
his countrymen. To his memory, honor. To his ashes, peace. 

REPRESENTATIVE LOUIS E. M'COMAS [REP.], OF MARYLAND, SAID : 

Mr. Speaker, on the last evening he was in the Senate Chamber I conversed with John 
A. Logan. His business with the world was done. I recall his face now, a noble image of 
the intrinsic Logan, as we here to-day speak of his pilgrimage through life. 

Sixty years of life, a brief section of swift-flowing time, but in it for true, hard labor and 
valor of action there has been none truer or braver than he. A farmer boy, at school in 
Southern Illinois ; before manhood, a soldier in our battles with far-off Mexico eager for 
glory-winning honors. A lawyer, a prosecuting attorney, and yielding to his bent for poli- 
tics, a member, a leader in the Illinois Legislature. At thirty-two, a Democratic member 
of this House, elected and re-elected as a Representative of the States-rights party. In his 
place here, true to it, until convinced that loyalty to party was disloyalty to the Union, 
when he closed his desk, left his seat, though not mustered in, fell in line with a regiment 
marching over the Potomac yonder, and fought for the Union in the first battle as a private 
soldier. Then, doing manifold victorious battle as he went along, he emerged at the tri- 
umphant close of war, from among a million volunteers, the foremost, the ideal volunteer 
soldier. 

While his hand was still familiar with the sword-hilt, while the habits of the camp were 
still visible in his port and swarthy face, he was returned to his seat in this Chamber, a man 
who knew in every fibre — who, with heroic daring, had laid it to heart — that it is good to 
fight on the right side. . . . He was the nearest, best friend of the volunteer, the peer 
of the highest officer, a brother to the humblest soldier, the sponsor of the Grand Army of 
the Republic, the founder of "Memorial Day." Faults and prejudices he had, but he was 
always loyal to truth and duty. 

Frank, impetuous, decisive, honest, he advocated his convictions with a scorn of personal 
consequence, in peace as in war, whether as a manager of the impeachment of President 
Johnson, defending Senator Payne, condemning General Porter, legislating for the recon- 
struction, or laboring for the education of an enfranchised race. 

The manliest of men, a marvellous leader of the people, a famous, popular orator, a great 
general, a statesman. Unsullied lie bore his crowding honors worthily in public life, and 
rejoiced in the sweet contentment of an almost ideal home-life. 

The friend of Lincoln and Grant, with their greater names posterity will associate 
Logan's heroic face, painted now, as on the azure of eternity, serene, victorious. God 
grant that the light he leaves behind him may illumine the path of those who may serve our 
country in her need for generations to come. 

REPRESENTATIVE ARCHIBALD J. WEAVER [REP.], OF NEBRASKA, SAID: 

Mr. SPEAKER : . . . The noble traits of character of John A. Logan have been 

ily tamped upon the hearts of the American people. His whole life as warrior and 

statesman was dedicated to giving full force and significance to that affirmation of the Dec- 

laration of Independence, " That all men are created equal ; that they are endowed by their 

ir with certain inalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit 

of happiness." 

ire the bugle-blast of war had called any of our country's defenders to the field, but 
when every movement of the discontented elements attested to the fearful truth that civil 
war with all it> dire consequences was about to test the national bond, upon this floor, iu 
February, 1SG1, John A. Logan said : 



APPENDIX. 



5^7 



I have been taught that the preservation of this glorious Union, with its broad flag waving over us as ihe 
shield of our protection on land and sea, is paramount to all parties and platforms that ever have existed or ever 
can exist. I would to-day, if I had the power, sink my own party, and every other one, with all their platforms, 
into the vortex of ruin, without heaving a sigh or shedding a tear, to save the Union or even to stay the revolu- 
tion where it is. 

This was but a patriotic declaration before the clash of arms, but in confirmation of his 
entire consecration and devotion to the preservation of the Union we have only to let impar- 
tial history hear witness. Not content to serve his country in the Halls of Congic^s, away 
from the exposure and danger of shot and shell, this brave man rushed into the thickest of 
battle. . . . 

In that contest for the preservation of the nation — for right against wrong, for freedom 
against slavery, for all that was good and pure and noble against all that was wicked 
and wrong and oppressive, wherein from the beginning of the contest to the close more than 
two and one-half millions of citizen soldiers placed their lives upon the altar of their country 
in that contest — we do know that John A. Logan was the greatest volunteer soldier, the 
greatest commander taken from civil life. He was the recognized leader of that great aimy 
of volunteer soldiers, and from the close of the war has been the defender and champion of 
the cause of the common soldier in the Congress of the United States. 

John A. Logan has been in the public service, almost continuously, for more than thirty 
years, and during all these years of faithful service his conduct has been so pure that not 
even a suggestion of corruption was ever associated with his name. . . . His whole life 
was dedicated to his country, to human rights, to making more firm and lasting the founda- 
tions of this Republic. He has woven his name in history with illustrious and praiseworthy 
deeds. Oh, that we had more Logans in the public service ! . 

REPRESENTATIVE BYRON M. CUTCHEON [REP.], OF MICHIGAN, SAID: 

Mr. Speaker, when on the 26th day of December last the intelligence was flashed across 
the land and under the seas that John A. Logan was dead, to millions of men it came with 
a sense of personal loss and bereavement. . . . His was a masterful nature that bends 
circumstances to his will, and brought men around him to work with him and for htm. It is 
given to but few men in a generation to become so positive a force among his fellow-men as 
Logan was. 

Perhaps few men were ever more strongly attached to a party than Logan was to his, 
but when it came to a question between party and country he knew no such thing as party 
allegiance. The first shot that cleft the stillness of Charleston Harbor as it boomed across 
the bay against Sumter, severed the last tie that bound him to a party he had loved and 
labored for until he had reached one-half the allotted age of man. In the fierce heat of his 
patriotism everything that might hold him back from supreme devotion to his country was 
burned away — utterly consumed. He at once resigned his seat in Congress, and returned to 
his State. 

Belmont, Donelson, Corinth, Champion Hills, Jackson, Raymond, and Vicksburg wit- 
nessed his valor and took reflected lustre from the gleam of his sword. Resaca, Kenesaw, 
Atlanta, and Jonesboro' are linked with his fame, and in large part owe their glory to his 
prowess, lie never elbowed his way to promotion, but promotion came to him almost of 
necessity. The eagle of the colonel gave way to the star on his shoulders after Uonelson, 
and that again was replaced by the double stars of the major-general, and these were but 
imperfect indices of his growth. 

As a soldier he was the very impersonation of intense energy. Men followed him be- 
cause they had no choice but to follow him. He was first of all intensely patriotic ; he was 
as brave as patriotic, and as magnanimous as he was brave. He possessed the confidence 
of his superiors, and the enthusiastic love of his soldiers. 

Of his return to Congress after the war and his career here for almost twenty years. I 
have not time to speak. Others have done that far better than I could. But during the 
four years that I knew him here it seemed to me that his life as a Senator and statesman 
was but the projective into another sphere of the traits that made him the splendid soldier 
that he was— intense patriotism, unlimited courage, strong virile force, honesty that was un- 
assailable, devotion to duty that took little account of consequences to self. . . . 

Does anyone doubt that Logan was great ? No one but a great man can fill a conti- 
nent with his name, can hold a great commonwealth in his grasp, can bind unknown millions 
to him who have never seen his face, so that his loss shall seem to each a personal bereave- 
ment. This Logan did. But he is discharged the service of this life— mustered out for 
promotion. 



S6S 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



Mr. Speaker, the devoted patriot, the brave soldier, the courageous statesman, the un- 
soiled Senator, the devoted husband and father, tiie soldier's friend, the peerless volunteer — 
he shall walk with us here no more. The tender (lowers we laid upon his coffin on that last, 
sad day of the old year have long since withered, and their fragrance passed away. Neither 
their loveliness nor their perfume had power to hold him hack from the dissolution of mor- 
tality nor from the corruption of the giave. And so with our eulogies to-day. They will 
fade with the passing hour. "The world will little note nor long remember what we say 
here, but it can never forget what he did here." 

Kl 1UKSENTATIVE WILLIAM L. WILSON [DEM.], OK WEST VIRGINIA, SAID : 

Mr, SPEAKER: . . . What was the trait in General Logan's character that drew and 
fastened to him as a permanent possession the favor of his fellow-citizens? . . . The 
"cap-stone and crowning virtue of his character was its brave and transparent singleness. 
Men saw his robust virtues and admired them ; they likewise saw the faults allied to them, 
and forgot them, because he wore them both upon his breast. They believed him to be 
just what he seemed to be, nothing more and nothing less. ... In this rare and noble 
virtue lay the germ of General Logan's hold on public favor, confidence, and his ever widen- 
ing popularity. 

But, sir, General Logan was not only, and perhaps not chiefly known as a civilian and 
Senator. When the seed of discord planted, or, rather should I say, consciously and help- 
lessly left in our Federal Constitution by its framers, had before the lapse of a single cen- 
tury of national existence, under the forcing heat of the slavery struggle, burst forth in the 
blood-red flower of civil war. General Logan was among the first, and most eager, to take 
part in the conflict. Of all the men that went forth from this Capitol, to range themselves 
on the one or the other side in that Titantic struggle, of all the men that entered either 
army from civil life, he came back bringing the greenest laurels and having the most unfad- 
ing glory, and, in the more than twenty years that have since elapsed, the lustre of that mar- 
tial glory added much to his power and influence in the councils of his party and of his 
country. 

.Sir, it is a noteworthy fact that in the memorial services, one week ago in the Senate, 
no heartier tributes were offered than those which came from men who had met him, not 
only in the hot contests of partisan strife, but in the fiercer combats of real war. They 
were sincere tributes of manly men to a manly man. 

No prouder boast was ever made than that of the old Ithacan, when he said that his 
little island was " a rough, wild nurse-land, but its crops were men." 

Nothing in American history has been more manly and more pathetic than the prayer 
that mingled so often with the dying breath and dying thoughts of the successful warrior, 
when he, too. surrendered to a warrior stronger than himself at Mount McGregor, for the 
complete return of harmony and good-feeling among his once-divided countrymen. When 
after centuries of stubborn contest the strife between the two orders at Rome had finally 
ceased, that strife that so often threatened to dissolve the state and quench forever its rising 
star, and plebeian and patrician, turning from the bitterness of the past and remembering 
only its glories, joined in that career of greatness that has as yet no counterpart in his- 
tory, the old warrior Camillus vowed a temple to Concord, and a later generation built 
that temple, whose remains are yet seen in the Roman forum. 

Mr. Speaker, was not the dying prayer of General Grant such an inspiration, such an 
injunction, such a vow? And will not some generation yet to come, it may be sooner than 
we expect, a generation freer from the passions and prejudices of the strife than we dare to 
be, build a temple to Concord, and in it place the marble statues of Grant and Lee, of 
Stonewall Jackson and Thomas, of Stuart and Hancock, McClellan and Logan, and others 

ntmed because yet among the living? Then, when future generations of American 
citizens shall come to view the temple, . . . they will stand uncovered in that presence 
and exclaim': " Though we have much that our fathers have not. though we know much 
that our fathers knew not, yet in this august company let us admit that their crops were 
men." 

REPRESENTATIVE WILLIAM W. RICE [REP.], OF MASSACHUSETTS, SAID: 

Mr. SPEAKKR, 1 bring a tribute from Mnssachusetts and place it reverently on the grave 
of Logan. lie had not, I believe, a drop of our blood in his veins • I do not know that he 
was ever within our borders excepting once or twice briefly in transit. His manners, his 
method of thought and speech, his political ideas, were not always by any means in accord 
with ours, yet I venture to say this soldier and statesman of the West, at the time of his 



APPENDIX. 



569 



death, held the first place in the hearts of the soldiers and common people of Massachusetts, 
who are her chiefest pride. 

Few men in t his age and country combined in so marked degree the characteristics which 
go to make up personal popularity. His massive frame, his glaring eye, his splendid 
strength, his undaunted courage would have made a hero of him at any time in any land. 
He would have "held the bridge" with Horatius, "in the brave days of old; " he would 
have led, amid clashing swords and spears, the wild warriors who came down from the 
north to the sack of Rome ; he would have couched lance in battle or in tourney with the 
toughest of Froissart's knights. As a patriot soldier he was bravest among the brave. 
At Belmont, at Donelson, at Vicksburg, at Atlanta, he led where any dared to follow. 
He never dodged a bullet or turned his face from the front. Had he been colled to do it, 
he would have scaled Wagner by the side of Shaw, or have kept his saddle, as Lowell 
did in the valley, after his death-wound, to lead one more charge against the breaking but 
still stubborn foe. 

But this was not all. By the sword peace had been won, but peace as well as war was to 
have work and triumphs for Logan. For more than twenty years he served in Congress, 
making his way by force of will, by clearness of judgment, by appreciation of popular in- 
stincts, and by honesty of purpose and action in such a degree that at his death his fame as 
a Senator was scarcely eclipsed by his old fame as a soldier. 

All his life he was a public man. . . . Let the young men of the country be en- 
couraged by the example of Logan and learn that there is no higher ambition than to fill 
worthily positions of public trust. 

Logan was a strong man. He never counted his friends or his foes. He knew his own 
position, and if he could not win others to it he was ready to defend it alone. 

He is dead — dead in the maturity of his strength and the plenitude of his powers — but 
his example lives. He has won a high place in our national Pantheon ; his name will live 
in history ; his memory is a precious legacy to those whom he has left behind him. Is this 
all ? Has the strong man utterly passed away ? Stands he no longer as a tower of strength 
for refuge and defence? Not so. It cannot be. The bugle-call should not sound "lights 
out " at his tomb. His light is not out ; though invisible to us, it still shines. 

REPRESENTATIVE LUCIEN B. CASWELL [REP.], OF WISCONSIN, SAID : 

Mr. Speaker : . . God gave Logan a talent and force of character seldom found 

among men. . . . Logan was a natural leader, both as a soldier and as a statesman. 
He had few equals in either sphere, and still less in the two combined. It is difficult 
to determine in which character he excelled most. But in either he served his country 
nobly and well. 

As a soldier he was fearless, and he was as gallant as he was brave, as generous as he 
was firm. 

In the House of Representatives, and afterward in the Senate, he was the author and ad- 
vocate of measures of great national interest. He took front rank as a legislator, always 
advocating whatever he believed to be right and for the interest of the people. If he erred, 
it was an error of the head and not of the heart. 

When the late war broke out he was not politically identified with the administration 
then in power. . . . It was enough for him that his country was in peril. Whatever 
party couid suppress the rebellion was the party of John A. Logan. 

The memories of his youth when he marched with the old flag to the capital of Mexico 
revived his love and devotion for his country, and again he was found in the front ranks of 
our Army. He went not as a stranger to battle but with a practical experience that well 
fitted him for the occasion. We had generals, trained in the arts of war, men of experience, 
educated for the purpose, men with commissions and arms already in line. But these were 
not sufficient. Our country called for volunteers. With them and the millions behind them, 
everything was possible; without them, nothing. General Logan was the representative of 
that element. He was early in the field. Thousands followed him, and the Union army 
was swollen to enormous proportions. These were the soldiery that saved the Union; 
without them it could never have been saved. . . . His military career was a success, 
and history will record him as a great leader of men. 

When the war was over he . . . obeyed the summons that sent him to the national 
Capitol. Here he made a record of which we are proud, a record that places him beside 
the great commoners whose names will be fostered and revered by generations yet to 
come. 



5 ~ LIFE OF LOGAN. 

His death carries sorrow and grief into the homes of the millions, and they join us to-day 
in these words of praise. His great service as a soldier in two wars, his distinguished abil- 
ity a> a statesman, his power and eloquence upon the rostrum, his devotion to the poor and 
the suffering, have made him conspicuous and dear to the American people, and he will 
he remembered and loved by them as the great soldier statesman by generations yet to 
come. 

REPRESENTATIVE JAMES E. O'HARA [REP.], OF NORTH CAROLINA, SAID : 

Mr. Speaker : ... If there was any one trait of the late General John A. Logan's 
strong character that appeared stronger than the other it was his great love for his country 
and the deep and abiding faith that his country was destined by God himself to be that 
country in which liberty in its broadest and most comprehensive term should find its greatest 
fulfilment. ... 

No greater example of love for one's country can be found than Logan's patriotic act 
when he exchanged a seat upon this floor for a common soldier's lot amid the stern realities 
and severity of camp-life when the well-being of his country was threatened, the Union en- 
dangered, and the sound to arms for the right was heard all over the land. How well he 
kept that pledge he then made let the answer be given by the fifty-two well-fought battles in 
which he was successively engaged from July 21, 1861, to April 26, 1865. Deeds like these 
will live in song and story and be recounted when and wherever the bards or historians 
gather to recite noble deeds for the emulation of the youth of this or any other land. . . . 

Mr. Speaker, this ceremony is not solely in honor of the dead, for neither " storied urn 
nor animated bust ; " but, sir, it is that, the lesson of this noble life, ended so suddenly, yet 
filled with honor and usefulness, may be emphasized and adorned as far as we are able to 
emphasize and adorn them ; that the same love of country, and love for one's fellow, may be 
held up as a noble example to those who may come after us ; and that posterity may know 
that the American Republic has heroes equal to if not surpassing in valor, fidelity, and 
patriotism, the fabled heroes of ancient Greece or Rome. 

REPRESENTATIVE NATHAN GOFF, JK. [REP.], OF WEST VIRGINIA, SAID : 

Mr. Speaker, we honor ourselves in honoring the memory of John A. Logan. Noth- 
ing that we can say or do to-day can add to nor detract from the renown of our distinguished 
dead, for it is no less than fame proclaims it, and it could be no greater than it is. . . . 
General Logan was the idol of the citizen soldiery of the war for the Union, and he was 
worthy of their admiration, for he was as grand as his cause and as true as steel. It is not 
disparagement to our grand galaxy of volunteer heroes to say that among the many he was 
the one. As the magnificent image of the Christ-God, in the great cathedral of Monreale, 
dominates the immensity of the building, as Pallas ruled supreme in the Parthenon, and 
Zeus in his Olympian temple, so does the name of Logan alone transcendent stand among 
that throng of heroes, dominating as with a single impulse the hearts of those who, neglect- 
ing all pursuits, abandoning all professions, leaving home, wife, children, all, of every creed 
and all parties, marched under the banner of the Union " into the very jaws of death " and 
tasted of the bitter dregs of the cup of sorrow and of pain in order that republican institu- 
tions might not perish from the face of the earth. 

General Logan lived in an eventful period and died in the fulness of his glory. He was 
an active participant in the memorable struggles that will render the nineteenth century 
I mi ms in battle and in history. He was no laggard in the strife, but he was always to the 
front with t he banner in his hands. He was determined in his purposes, sincere in his con- 
victions, and grand in his achievements. Contending for republican government, he lived 
to see the Constitution of his country cleansed of impurities and firmly established on the 
eternal principles of truth and justice. He was a devotee at the shrine of human liberty, 
and he lived to see all men free. He believed in the education of the people, and he lived 
to see his country blessed with the grandest system of free universal education that a propi- 
tious Providence has ever permitted the children of men to enjoy. With all the earnestness 
of his impulsive nature did he love the starry banner of our independence, the emblem of our 
n.it i )n's power, and he lived to see it typify, at last, all that is great in human action, all 
that is grand in human thought. 

It is not laudation for us to say that in all these stirring scenes and wonderful changes 
he played a leader's part and that he stamped his strong individuality on these pages. Hon- 



APPENDIX. 



571 



ored statesman, grand soldier, true friend, honest man, may your sleep in the quiet city of 
the dead be the rest of those who, 

Sustained and soothed 
By an unfaltering trust, approach their grave, 
Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch 
About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams. . . . 

He is dead ; he has gone, . . . and yet he will live here for all time. He will he 
with us, Mr. Speaker, while we tarry, and he will stay after we have gone. His is one of 
those illustrious lives that death cannot destroy. 

REPRESENTATIVE EDWIN S. OSUORNE [REP.], OF PENNSYLVANIA, SAID : 

Mr. Speaker, we come to pay tribute to the memory of John A. Logan, whose name 
has rung through the world and won its meed of praise. Living men may contemplate his 
character and draw from it lessons of purest virtue and loftiest patriotism. His whole career 
was a bright example of unselfish devotion to duty. Indeed the Republic drew profit from 
his life. In centuries to come, amid the grandeur of its power and the unclouded splendor 
of its renown, the historian of our country will point to Logan as one who did much in his 
day to save the Republic from death. 

Sounding words cannot tell the strength of mind, the physical courage, the daring and 
fortitude that made up his character. When he led our flag to victory and gave to glory and 
to fame the fields on which armies struggled, when amid the carnage of the hour he rode 
along his line, suffering with pain from bleeding wounds, inspiring his troops with his own 
brave spirit, until like a restless wave they swept away every obstacle, the selfish and ungen- 
erous may have spoken unkindly of him, but now that he is beyond the reach of ambition 
the man does not live who would have the name of John A. Logan forgotten. His is a 
name that the world will not willingly let die. He needs no splendid arches of victory, no 
monumental pile pointing toward heaven and covered all over with the story of his deeds to 
perpetuate his memory, for he is enshrined in the hearts of the people, there to remain as 
long as a sentiment of justice is felt or a cord of sympathetic virtue vibrates in a human 
heart. 

REPRESENTATIVE lewis e. payson [rep.], OF ILLINOIS, SAID : 

Mr. Speaker, . . . General Logan was my friend, and I perform a sad duty to 
the memory of one whose good-will and confidence was so prized in his lifetime by me when 
I attempt to add a single leaf to the garland of tribute which shall be rendered to him and 
his memory this day. 

His chief characteristic to me was his earnestness in whatever he was engaged. His 
devotion to his friends was conspicuous for its intensity. His love for the soldiers of the 
civil war— his companions in arms — was best evidenced by his labors for their interests and 
by their affection for him. His affection for his State was as that of the Roman for " the 
city of seven hills." Duty, honor, and integrity were active principles in his daily life, and 
he squared his conduct by their requirements. In his affections he was generous and ardent ; 
his bravery, his courage was always conspicuous ; true in his nature and of gentle heart, and 
magnanimous in all his dealings. Patriotism with him was more than a sentiment ; it was a 
deep-seated principle. Love of country, its institutions, its Constitution, and its laws, was 
his inspiration from the days of his early manhood. To insincerity he was a stranger ; to 
him conviction carried with it the sense of duty to follow it ; and with his bravery, his 
frankness, no one was ever in ignorance as to his position on any question. To such a 
degree was this carried that at times his position in his party was hazarded by fearless asser- 
tion of his ideas of right as opposed to those of mere temporary policy or expediency. 

General Logan was a born leader. He was endowed by nature with all the attributes 
and qualities for such a position. . . . He had the aggressiveness which always comes 
from a true courage. . . . His life was a success. . . . He died the deserved 
possessor of these honors and left his family that best of heritage, a reputation untarnished, 
an integrity unimpaired, and a feeling on the part of the whole people that the loss in his 
death was one common to all. ... 

REPRESENTATIVE JAMES D. BRADY [REP.], OF VIRGINIA, SAID : 

Mr. Speaker, the heart that would not be sad and the eye that would not be dim while 
memory in its many forms clusters around the dead patriot, soldier, and statesman in whose 
honor the nation's Representatives are to-day assembled must be hard and dry indeed. 



572 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



Amid grief so deep and so universal no words of mine can fitly portray tlie sorrow of the 
volunteer soldiers of the war for the maintenance of the Union over the irreparable loss of 
their grand chieftain. The heart speaks loudest when the lips will not move. 

John A. Logan was regarded as national property. His genius, his virtues, his great 
services in peace and in war, were esteemed a part of the inheritance of the whole people. 
Bold and direct in his opinions and actions, however they were sustained or combated, 
he was nevertheless admired liy all for his great abilities as he was honored and respected for 
his purity of character. Mis fame was national, and his loss has been felt as national. The 
whole country, not only his State which loved and honored him, mourns over his sad death. 
The evidences of genuine sorrow in all sections of our country, when his demise was an- 
nounced, indicates a strong national sympathy, a bond of union which political differences 
cannot weaken, much less destroy. 

General Logan was at the top among the great heroes of the Union during and since the 
war ; he won immortality on the field and in the forum ; lie had impressed himself upon the 
age, and he is missed as a shining light extinguished in the darkest hour of the night. . . . 

I shall not recount the splendid story of his life. His deeds in war and in peace have 
gained for him imperishable renown. . . . Alas, John A. Logan, the foremost general 
of volunteers, is dead. I think I hear some comrade say, " Would that he had fallen on the 
battle-field with the flag he loved so well waving over him, and the shout of triumph ringing 
in his ears " No ; his task at the close of the war was only half finished. He has since 
bravely fought on other battle-fields, and in the press of the continued conflict he conquered 
peace, prosperity, and happiness for his country. His journey from the cradle to the grave 
is done. 

He it was that originated the beautiful memorial services over the graves of the soldier 
dead. Crippled veteians and stalwart soldiers, aged mothers — ye whose sons were sacrificed 
upon the country's battle-fields — broken-hearted widows, comrades of the Grand Army and 
Loyal Legion, sons and daughters of the Boys in Blue, upon each observance of that day 
gather the most beautiful, the most fragrant flowers of May and deck the grave of John A. 
Logan ! 

REPRESENTATIVE ROBERT R. HITT [REP.], OF ILLINOIS, SAID : 

Mr. Speaker, the death of General Logan has suddenly removed the greatest of the 
volunteers who survived. The shock of surprise and sorrow was scarcely greater here, where 
we suddenly missed him from each day's action, than it was throughout the whole country, 
so closely was he knit to the hearts of tens of thousands who watched from day to day all 
that he did — and he did more than other men all the time. His abrupt taking off in the 
midst of greatest activity was something akin to falling in battle; for there was no sign of 
coming age or decaying strength in his thick jet-black hair, his keen eye, and his powerful 
frame that stood four-square to all the winds that blow. He was, as he looked, a hearty 
man, of sturdy, tenacious, Scotch-Irish stock. He drew his blood from positive, indepen- 
dent characters, both father and mother. 

The minor features and details in the long story of his life and its work will gradually lose 
some of their interest as those who have known him pass away with advancing time. But 
there are some immense facts which will last in history and preserve his name through many 
centuries, keeping it fresh in the knowledge of men. 

First. The great service he rendered to his country as a soldier in the most critical period 
in the life of the Republic. 

Second. His incessant labors as a legislator for over thirty years in behalf of every meas- 
ure that ne believed to be for the elevation of all the people. He made a mistake sometimes, 
but as soon as he discovered it he promptly changed and frankly avowed it. His whole life 
was progress. He wanted to see the children of the poorest man educated. He encouraged 
love of country and care for those who suffered for it. He strove to build up and develop 
every interest and every industry that would tend to make the lives of men comfortable, intel- 
ligent, and happy. He gave in his own life an example of spotless integrity as a public man. 
1 le was full of ambition, but nothing in it was sordid or venal. His ambitions were all noble. 
He gave the best years of his life to the cause office government and human liberty. 

I . toking back to-day over his splendid career, cut off when he was in his highest usefulness, 
everyone feels the great loss the nation suffered on the day when that incompleted life was 
abruptly terminated. There seemed many years before him still to serve the country he 
hived so well with his great powers matured by long and varied experience. 



APPENDIX. 



573 



But it is over. His work is done. The story of Logan's life will illumine the brightest 
pages of our history, and the fruits of his incessant labors, all devoted to his country and his 
fellow-men, and known to all the world, will preserve his name and perpetuate his influence 
beyond his life through all the long hereafter. 

REPRESENTATIVE WILLIAM R. COX [DEM.], OF NORTH CAROLINA, SAID: 

Mr. Speaker and Representatives : . . . We are all citizens of a great and 
glorious country, having common hopes and aspirations. . . . And it is the inspiration 
arising from the freedom of our institutions and the progress of our people that made possi- 
ble the successful career of John A. Logan. 

Seldom in history do we behold illustrious examples of success achieved through indi- 
vidual efforts in more than one special calling, and thus is made more emphatic the blended 
triumphs we in him behold. Without the heritage of fortune or the prestige of an illustrious 
name, John A. Logan sprang from the loins of the people ; he claimed leadership among 
men, and by industry, integrity, and high resolves the ranks were open to him; he marched 
to the front, and held his position until the last dread summons came. . . . When he 
believed it necessary to assert the right and expose the wrong, his blows fell as unrelent- 
ingly on the head of a party friend as on that of a political adversary. To maintain a politi- 
cal leadership under such circumstances required commanding talents and distinguished 
virtues. 

A volunteer soldier, he looked not so much to the method as to the object to be accom- 
plished. He wielded not the high-tempered cimeter of a Saladin, but rather the trenchant, 
two-edged sword of Richard the Lion-Hearted. 

In writing and speaking he was not always considerate of the feelings of those to whom 
he was opposed in the war. Yet while they would have preferred to applaud his magnanim- 
ity toward the vanquished, they are not strenuous to condemn the natural impulses of his 
ardent nature. . . . My personal acquaintance with him was limited, and I speak only 
from impressions entertained by those among whom I live. From Southern Representatives 
with whom he served in Congress I have heard of his liberality, sincerity, and honesty in 
dealing with Southern men and measures, and I was gratified to know of this phase of his 
character. 

In conclusion I place this garland upon the tomb of General Logan, and will add this, 
though he walked amid temptations his character was stainless, and that while he served his 
country faithfully he died poor. It is pleasing to reflect that in the hearts and abundance of 
his appreciative countrymen his family are not forgotten. 

REPRESENTATIVE GEORGE G. SYMES [REP.], OF COLORADO, SAID : 

Mr. Speaker : . . . Many have denied that John A. Logan was a great man. 
But, sir, great acquirements, learning, and accomplishments . . . never made 
a great man. If, while General Logan was battling to overcome the hardships of pioneer 
life his time had been spent poring over books in Eastern colleges; if, when the war with 
Mexico broke out and he was twenty years of age his own taste or ambition or that of his 
parents had sent him to seats of learning in Germany, to be filled with all the knowledge 
that books and professors could impart, instead of going to the battle-fields of his country ; 
if, during the years intervening between the Mexican War and 1858, when he was elected a 
member of this House from Southern Illinois, his time had been divided between reading 
polite literature, travelling in Europe, visiting art galleries, and mixing in the highest society, 
and the remainder of it only devoted to the profession of the law in some large city, it is 
certain he never would have rendered the great services to his country in her time of need 
which his countrymen now universally acknowledge ; and he never would have died uni- 
ver.-ally mourned as the champion and friend of the American people. He never would 
have passed down to history as one of the great statesmen and the greatest American citizen- 
soldier of his time. As that brilliant orator and statesman from Virginia, John Randolph, 
of Roanoke, once said in this House : 

The talent for government lies in two things, sagacity to perceive and the decision to act. Genuine states- 
men were never made by such training. . . . Let a house be on fire and you will soon see in that confusion 
who has the talent to command. . . . Who believes that Washington could write as good a book or report 
as Jefierson. or make as able a speech as Hamilton ? Who is there that believes that Oomwel! would have made 
as good a judge as Lord Hale? No, Mr. Speaker, these learned and accomplished men find their proper place 
under those who are fitted to command and to command them among the rest. . . . Great logicians and 
great scholars are for that vsry reason unfit to be riders. Would Hannibal have crossed the Alps where there 
were no roads, with elephants, in the face of the warlike hardy mountaineers, and have carried terror to the 
very gates of Rome if his youth had been spent in poring over books? "Are you not ashamed," said a philos- 



574 LIFE 0F LOGAN. 

oplier, to one who was born to rule, "are you no: ashamed to play so well upon the flute?" There is much 
« in, i he* miii's a secondary man to know, much that it is necessary tor him to know, that a first-rate man ought 
to be ashamed to know. No head was ever clear and sound that was stuffed with book-learning. . . . 
Alter all, the chief must draw upon his subalterns for much that he does not know and cannot perform himself. 

Mr. Speaker, John A. Logan was a great orator. . . . When we test the speeches 
of John A. Logan, delivered on public and important occasions, by their results, we cannot 
deny to him the distinction of being a great orator and an eloquent man. As has been said 
by Webster : 

True eloquence indeed does not consist in speech. It cannot be brought from far. Labor and learning may 
toil for it, but they will toil for it in vain. It must exist in ihe man, in the subject, and in the occasion. . . . 
Thegraces taught in the schools, the costly ornaments and studied contrivances of speech shock and disgust 
men when their own lives and the fate of their wives, their children, and their country hang on the decision of 
the hour. Then words have lost their power, rhetoric is vain, and all elaborate oratory contemptible. . . . 
Then patriotism is eloquent : then self-devotion is eloquent. The clear conception outrunning the deductions of 
logic, the high purpose, the firm resolve, the dauntless spirit speaking on the tongue, beaming from the eye, in- 
forming every feature and urging the whole man onward, right onward, to his object. This is eloquence; or 
rather, it is something greater and higher than all eloquence ; it is action, noble, sublime, godlike action. 

Sir, are not these words of one of the great masters, whose eloquence and oratory adorned 
and influenced both Houses of Congress for so many years, specially applicable to the ora- 
tory of John A. Logan ? Have we a man in this generation who, at critical periods in our 
country's history, at times, sir, when the fate of our country was at stake and " the die 
seemed to spin somewhat doubtful," threw himself into the breach with a more dauntless 
spirit, with a more firm resolve speaking on his tongue or beaming from his eye and urging 
him on with a more sublime and godlike action than John A. Logan? It is matter of his- 
tory that at such times he changed the opinions and convictions of thousands of men by the 
power of his oratory. . . . • 

Mr. Speaker, he has passed away, and we poor mortals can do nothing more than mourn 
his loss and revere and keep the memory of his many virtues for our own bright example. 
No American has died in this generation who will be so universally missed by all classes and 
conditions of men as John A. Logan. The Grand Army of the Republic soldiers will miss 
him when endeavoring to obtain their rights. The statesmen will miss his cool and unfaltering 
intrepidity in the support of measures for the good of our country. The great mass of the 
people will miss and mourn him when their rights require courageous defence. 

REPRESENTATIVE FRANK LAWLER [DEM.], OF ILLINOIS, SAID : 

Mr. Speaker : . . . I have not awaited the hour of his death to praise John A. 
Logan for it was my fortune to know him, perhaps not intimately in the social sense, but 
measurably as we were brought into contact and collision in the various political conflicts in 
Illinois. He was a foeman worthy of the foeman's steel, but withal generous and consider- 
ate in the hour of victory, submitting to defeat without murmur or complaint. My respect 
for John A. Logan augmented into admiration when the grand spectacle was presented of 
his graceful submission to the will of the majority expressed adversely to his election to the 
Vice-Presidency in November, 1884. 

I have often instituted a comparison in my own mind of like traits of character possessed 
by General Logan with some of those of Samuel Adams, of Revolutionary fame. I can 
well imagine that had Logan been a member of the Continental Congress, when that body 
dei 1 ired the colonies free and independent of England's domination, he would have boldly 
proclaimed with Samuel Adams : 1 

1 should advise persisting in our struggle for liberty, though it were revealed from Heaven that nine hundred 
ii'.ty-nnie were to perish and only one of a thousand were to survive and retain his liberty ! One such 
■ 11 must possess more virtue and enjoy more happiness than a thousand slaves; and let him propagate 
his like, and transmit to them what he hath so nobly preserved. 

Like Samuel Adams, John A. Logan combined in a remarkable manner those qualities 
of firmness and aggressiveness that qualify a man to be the asserter of the rights of the 
people. Like Samuel Adams, he was superior to pecuniary considerations, and proved his 
cause by the virtue of his conduct. Like Samuel Adams, the service he rendered his coun- 
try in the national councils was not by brilliancy of talent or profoundness of learning, but 
through resolute decision, unceasing watchfulness, and heroic perseverance. 

General Logan's military achievements are written in living light upon the pages of his- 
tory. . . 



APPENDIX. 



575 



A great American lias fallen in the very plenitude of his usefulness, and the Republic 
mourns the loss, as it has mourned the loss of other patriots gone before. . . . Our 
friend died as he had lived, honored and respected, not alone by the people within the broad 
boundaries of the American Republic, but by man and woman in all lands where liberty or 
the hope of liberty throbs within their besoms. 

REPRESENTATIVE BISHOP W. PERKINS [REP.], OF KANSAS, SAID : 

Mr. Speaker: ... It was in this Chamber that John Alexander Logan first be- 
came known to the people of this country, and it was from this Chamber that he went as a 
volunteer to tight. . . 

From his first enlistment until the last gun was fired he was the incarnation of war. 
War to him was a terrible, a cruel reality, but that lives might be spared, peace secured, 
and tranquillity restored, he would make war with the heaviest guns, the strongest battalions, 
the best equipped divisions, and prosecute it with all the energy and earnestness that could 
be given to human organizations. 

But when the belching of cannon ceased, when victory crowned our arms, and peace was 
restored to our bleeding country, it saw General John A. Logan crowned by the plaudits of 
the people the greatest volunteer soldier of the Republic. 

At the close of the war when the armies of the Republic were disbanded and martial 
strife had ceased, General Logan returned to his home. But there was no repose for him. 
By divine right he was a leader of men. At the forum, in the council chamber, and upon 
the hustings it was his imperial right to lead as well as upon the field of conflict and carnage, 
and after a short respite from public duties he was returned to this Chamber as the Rep- 
resentative at Large from the State of Illinois, and from that time on until the day of his 
death he was one of the most distinguished figures in our political history. 

Mr. Speaker, few men in American history have left such an impress of their individual- 
ity upon the public mind and such a brilliant record of grand and glorious achievements as 
General John A. Logan. . . 

As citizen, as lawyer, as soldier, as legislator, as statesman and orator, as husband, father, 
and friend, we honor him, and his glory is a part of the resplendent and imperishable history 
of our country. 

On the last day of the old year, with muffled drums and drooping flags, General John A. 
Logan was laid to rest. It was a raw, cloudy, December day, and the snow lay white on 
the country hills and crunched under the feet of the walkers in the streets of the city. A 
dull, gray sky hung overhead and at times the winter rain poured in freezing torrents upon 
the ground. All nature seemed touched with sympathy at the nation's loss, and joined in 
the tears and sobs of the mourning multitude. He had died the Sunday before, and how 
fitting that this closing scene in the soldier's life should come with the close of the year. 
John A. Logan and the old year went out together. That dark but handsome face, that 
manly bearing, will be seen no more on this side the " dark river " to whose cold tide we 
are all hastening. 

But his memory will endure as long as the English language, and the remembrance of 
his great deeds will be as imperishable. Honest, incorruptible, and true, tender as a 
woman, brave as a lion, trusting as a child, his life passed to its ending without stain and 
without reproach. 

REPRESENTATIVE AUGUSTUS H. PETTIBONE [REP.], OF TENNESSEE, SAID : 

Mr. Speaker, in one of his most brilliant lectures delivered during the time of our civil 
war at the University of Cambridge, Goldwin Smith, speaking of that splendid Puritan 
corps known as the Ironsides, which Oliver Cromwell organized and disciplined, uses in sub- 
stance this language; " That splendid yeomanry, with high hopes and comictions of their 
own, who conquered for English liberty at Naseby, at Worcester, and at Marston Moor, in 
their native England, are now seen no more. Here they have left a great, perhaps a fatal, 
gap in the ranks of freedom." "But," he adds with something of pride and enthusiasm, 
"under Grant and Sherman they still conquer for the good old cause." 

And what, sir, is that good old cause? Do we not know that it is the cause of Liberty 
against Slavery? That it is the cau*e of freedom against privileged usurpation ? 

" That splendid yeomanrv" which the historian thus eulogizes, transferred over sea, be- 
came the fathers and founders of this great Republic of the West. The heart and core, as 
we know, came from England. It was re-enforced from Scotland and from Ireland. In 
later years it has welcomed German and Scandinavian auxiliaries. When the time came to 



/6 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



sever the political connection between the colonies and Great Rritain, a hundred years ago, 
it was the yeomanry, informed and instructed by Franklin, and Samuel Adams, and Thomas 
Jefferson, and led and disciplined by Greene, and Wayne, and Washington, who won the 
independence of these States and established this Union. 

And when, in 1861, the storm of civil war " blackened all our horizon," it was the yeo- 
manry, we know, who furnished the volunteer soldiers who filled the ranks of the Union 
army, and in the most desperate of campaigns, in the direst civil war of all time, by their 
persistence, and steadiness, and valor, carried the starry flag to victory and saved to the 
cause of civil liberty and forthcoming generations this land of our love and devotion ; and 
by universal consent first of these volunteers was John Alexander Logan ! . . . He re- 
signed his seat on this floor. He spoke with a tongue of fire to the yeomanry of his district 
and his Slate. He rallied around him a regiment. With his thousand comrades in arms 
he swore to maintain, to preserve, and to protect the Constitution of the United States, and 
he went forth to the dangers of uncertain war animated by the very spirit in which the angel 
of freedom speaks in the magnificent language of Whittier : 

Then Freedom sternly said, "I shun 

No strife nor pang beneath the sun 

When human rights are staked and won. 
" I knelt with Zisco's hunted flock, 

I watched in Toussaint's cell of rock, 

I walked with Sidney to the block. 
" The Moor of Marston felt my tread, 

Through Jersey snows the march I led, 

My voice Magenta's charges sped." 

It was to maintain, not to disintegrate ; to preserve, not to destroy, that Logan donned 
his country's uniform of blue. With reluctance, and almost with heart-break he took up 
the gage of battle. He knew what war is. He knew its horrors, and all its blighting 
curses. But he was a man of the people. He was simply and always one of the plain peo- 
ple on whom Abraham Lincoln relied. 

He was ever king of hearts. His comrades loved him because they could not help it. 
And sir, ever since the war-drum has ceased to beat he has been enshrined in the very hearts 
of the old soldiers of the Union. We loved him as we really loved no other great soldier of 
the war, and we know how he loved the boys in blue in return. 

On the 3d of Tuly, 1863, at Vicksburg, between the lines, it was my fortune, as it was of 
thousands of othe'rs, to see the meeting of Grant and Pemberton when the terms of the fa- 
mous surrender were agreed to. Accompanying his great commander was Logan, then in 
the prime and very flower of his magnificent manhood. His long, black hair, how it shone 
in that sunlight! 

I seem to see him to-day as he then stood on that open ground in the clear light of that 
hot July sun. His every unconscious pose and movement seemed instinct with his character 
and heroic purpose. Ami so, sir, he will ever stand out in the clear perspective of history. 
As he stood that day, out against a background of clear blue sky. the observed of all who 
saw that scene, so forever — fit comrade of his chieftain, Grant — 

Let his great example stand 

Colossal, seen of every land, 

To keep the soldier firm, the statesman pure, 

Till through all lands and through all human story, 

The path of duty be the way to glory. 

REPRESENTATIVE MARTIN A. HAYNES [REP.], OF NEW HAMPSHIRE, SAID: 

Mr. SPEAKER, if I were asked what element in General Logan's character I most ad- 
mired, I should answer his constancy and his consistency. It was his high distinction to be gen- 
erally recognized as the most illustrious example the war produced of the citizen soldier as 
distinguished from the professional ; and when the great citizen armies disbanded and turned 
their faces so joyfully to their homes and the pursuits of peace, he maintained an equal dis- 
tinction as the soldier's friend in the legislative councils of the nation. . . . 

There is in the hearts of brave men who with their lives in their hands battle for their con- 
victions a chord which vibrates with admiration and respect, and even with a sort of affection, for 
those among their opponents who deal the hardest blows in honorable warfare. Such a man 
was Logan the soldier, and it is a matter of common knowledge and observation with those of 
us who wore the Union blue that our regard for the manly, soldierly qualities of our fallen 
chief was shared in an almost equal degree by those who wore the Confederate gray. 

As he commanded the admiration of his comrades in war, in peace he won their love and 



APPENDIX. ^yy 

their affection. On the battle-field he was their trusted leader. In the council-halls he was 
their steadfast champion and friend. 

When the tidings of his unexpected death was flashed over the country it brought mourn- 
ing to the humble home of many a soldier to whom Logan was known only by name and by 
reputation. A million of these, who never met him, who never saw him, felt that they had 
suffered a personal loss which could never be replaced. It is a proud record that Logan has 
left as a soldier. It will be quoted that after a long public career he leaves a name un- 
stained even by a suspicion of dishonor. But there will be no prouder monument to his 
memory than the love and affection which so long as life shall last will dwell in the hearts of 
those who were his comrades in the war which assured the perpetuity of the Union and the 
grandeur of our common country. 

REPRESENTATIVE JAMES BUCHANAN [REP.], OF NEW JERSEY, SAID: 

Mr. Speaker, it did not seem like Logan to die. That well-knit frame, piercing eye, 
and elastic step, all spoke of life and vigor, and added years of activity. But even as we 
looked with admiration upon his strength and vitality, the conqueror came, strength became 
weakness, and life was death. 

Others have spoken of his early life and its trials and triumphs, of his deeds of valor as 
the citizen soldier, and his long and brilliant career as a statesman. Mine the lot for a few 
brief minutes to speak of him as an orator and a scholar. 

He had the best of all attributes of the orator, an intense conviction of the truth of his 
utterances, and an earnestness of manner born of that conviction. . . . This it was 
which gave him such power as an orator. This it was which enchained the attention of his 
fellow-Senators and thronged the halls where he spoke. The world will always listen to an 
earnest and sincere man. Rhetoric and grace and sweetness, rounded period, and swelling 
peroration, all these please the ear, but Logan hurled rugged truth, in impassioned utter- 
ance, at the mind and conscience of his hearers. He did not stop to parley, but thundered 
out his thought and moved straight upon the enemy's works. A debate was with him no 
dress-parade, but a battle as real and earnest for the time being as any he had helped to 
win as a soldier beneath his country's flag. 

And yet when the occasion came he could be gentle as a child and tender as a woman. 
Let a comrade fall by the way and no tenderer or kinder voice spoke his virtues than the 
voice of Logan. 

Less than one year ago, standing beside the tomb of his great leader, Grant, he uttered 
these words : 

Friends, this noble man's work needs no monument, no written scroll, in order that it may be perpetuated. 
It is higher than the dome of St. Paul's, loftier than St. Peter's, it rears itself above the Pyramids, it soars be- 
yond the highest mountain-tops, and it is written in letters of the sunbeam across the blue arch that forever 
looks down upon the busy tribes of men. 

Logan was a scholar. Go to the library in yonder lonely home. Look over the volumes 
which fill its shelves. The best thought of ancient and modern times is there. The treas- 
ures of Greek and Roman stand side by side with the gems of German, French, and English 
literature. His books were read, studied, mastered. No idle ornaments these. Daily com- 
panions of the master were they. No delight so keen after his years of activity in camp and 
field as to sit surrounded by these mighty minds and hold deep converse with them, and as 
the years rolled by their influence was shown more and more with each successive utterance, 
until his great "oration at the tomb of Grant " showed how ripe a scholar he had become. 

Human utterances pass away with the occasion and are forgotten. Here and there one 
survives and passes into the world's treasure-house of thought. That oration of his will 
live. It contains the seeds of immortality. None but the mind of a scholar could have con- 
ceived it, and wrought it into form with its wealth of illustration and allusion. As he pict- 
ures the Pyramids of Egypt, the Tombs of Mexico, the Sculptures of Yucatan, and the 
Mounds of North America as mute witnesses of man's yearning after immortality, we think 
with what a wealth of effort these material structures were wrought, and forget the years of 
patient thought and unwearied study which qualify a mind to give to the world an immortal 
thought. 

That patient thought, that unwearied study was his. Shall his work survive the coming 
centuries? The pyramid-builder mouldered into dust almost ere history began, and his work 
yet stands. So, too, the child rescued from " the marshes of the Nile" has left his impress 
on thirty centuries of mind and thought. A yearning for immortality, a desire to leave an 
impress upon the thought of his age, seems to have been upon Logan as he penned that ora- 
tion, and it will take its place among the works the world will not let die. . . . 



573 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



REPRESENTATIVE JAMES H. WARD [DEM.], OF ILLINOIS, SAID: 

Mr. Speaker : . . . there is an immortality beyond this life. The power of a 
great mind, the success of a superior human intellect, cannot be buried in death, and Logan 
will live forever in memory's world. 

His civil services began in 1S49 as clerk of his county court; he served his people in the 
Illinois Legislature in 1852, 1853, 1856, and 1857, and served in the Thirty-sixth, Thirty- 
seventh, Fortieth, and Forty-first Congresses, and in the United States Senate from 1871 to 
1S77. Again he obeyed the people's call and was returned to the United States Senate in 
1879, and was re-elected in 1885, where he was found busy when the great summons came, 
" Cease from labor." 

It would appear difficult to add to this lifetime of public service. When the boy had 
barely merged into the man he left home and its comforts, profession and its ambition, to 
enter the United States Army as a private in the war with Mexico. Again with his loyal 
fellow-citizens he volunteered to defend his country against internal enemies. lie served 
throughout that war, starting in as colonel, coming out as major-general. His work was 
done amid the smoke and iron hail of Belmont, Donelson, Shiloh, Vicksburg, Lookout 
Mountain, Atlanta, and in the march to the sea. 

By the brilliancy of his movements, by the chivalry of his conduct, he unconsciously made 
himself the idol of the American soldiery. The peer of the highest, the friend of the humblest 
in the land, John A. Logan was a model American citizen. He was a statesman whose pu- 
rity of character prevented his being a mere politician. Firm in his political convictions, as 
he was in all his opinions after due consideration, he was also as invincible a warrior in the 
arena of politics as when a soldier in the field of actual war, and as cowardice was impossible 
to him in the latter, so neither was he unjust or malicious in debate. 

Successful or defeated, he came out of his public contests without the shadow of malice 
or revenge. In private life his character was as unspotted as in public. 

Viewing such a character in all its rounded grandeur, I may close my remarks by hold- 
ing that character up as a picture-lesson to the young men of our country. 

REPRESENTATIVE JACOB H. GALLINGER [REP.], OF NEW HAMPSHIRE, SAID: 

Mr. Speaker : when a few weeks ago, in the solitude of my own home, 

bowed down by a great personal sorrow, the news of the death of John A. Logan flashed 
over the wires, I could not but feel that another personal grief had come to my heart. For 
every man in this nation who loves liberty and loyalty and law loved him in whose memory 
these words of eulogy are being spoken to-day. . . . His record is written on every 
page of the history of his country, especially since the troublous times commencing in 1S60. 
When the nation needed brave men to defend it Logan threw all his energy, strength, and 
heroism into the scale and came out of that terrible struggle with a record for bravery and 
military skill equal at least to that of any man who fought on either side. Rapidly rising 
from a private to major-general, he was the pride and glory of the men whom he com- 
manded. 

But Logan was not only a great soldier — he was equally a great civil leader. Examine 
the long record of his public life, and not a blot is on the page. Earnest, aggressive, and 
eloquent, his words always reflected honest convictions and high purposes. . . 

In every department of life — whether as soldier, legislator, councillor, or friend — in the 
army, in the Senate, or anywhere among his fellow-men, he was the circle of profound re- 
spect and loving admiration. 

In my own State, on a lofty mountain-peak, is the perfect face of a man, formed by the 
rocks without the aitl of human intelligence or human effort. Tourists from distant lands 
come to gaze upon " the great stone face," and go away with feelings of awe and admira- 
tion. It is a grand face — grand in its dignity and its impressiveness — a face that haunts one in 
after years, and tells the story of nature's grandeur and glory. And so, too, there are men 
who tower to the mountain-tops of human experience and acquirement, and look down upon 
their fellows in the valleys below. Such a man was Logan — a great, strong, noble soul — 
a natural leader of men, and utterly incapable of the petty meannesses that mar so many 
lives. . . . 

REPRESENTATIVE RALPH PLUMB [REP.], OF ILLINOIS, SAID: 

Mr. Speaker : . . . from the sparkling waters of the Aroostook to the murky Rio 
Grande Del Norte, from the Everglades of Florida to beyond the Olympic Mountains to far- 



APPENDIX. 579 

off Alaska, there is no city or town, and scarce a rural neighborhood, where the thoughts 
and emotions of people have not been profoundly moved by the event we are here to con- 
template. . . . 

General Logan lived in a period of our national history replete with remarkable events 

a period in which men in public life encountered those crucial tests that not only developed 
characters, but decided whether they were to live in the hearts of their countrymen as bene- 
factors of the race, or, on the contrary, to be either entirely forgotten or remembered only 
to be execrated. 

The shock of the rebellion revealed young Logan to himself; it found him a politician, it 
made him a statesman. . . . He knew that the true patriot would give his life, if need 
be, to his country ; and without hesitation or delay he entered the service, was a true and 
gallant soldier, an able and successful commander. . 

When the rebellion had been crushed, and Logan was once more in his place in the 
councils of the nation, he met each question that arose in the trying work of reconstruction 
in the same way that he decided to change his political course — by choosing what was right, 
and going straight forward to accomplish it. 

Sir, the State which I have the honor in part to represent on this floor has furnished her 
full quota of the illustrious men who have been great actors in the period in our national 
history to which I have referred. That grandest of Presidents (Lincoln) and that greatest of 
captains (Grant) both matured their manhood as citizens of Illinois, but Logan, worthy to 
have been the Chief Magistrate of the nation, the great volunteer general of the war, whose 
name and memory will be linked with Lincoln and Grant as long as history shall be read, 
Illinois proudly claims as her son, . . . 

Let monuments be erected to his memory, let orator and poet chronicle his worthy 
deeds ; but when the marble no longer depicts to our eyes his manly figure, when eloquence 
and song can no longer charm us with the recital of his noble qualities, coming generations 
will speak of his worth and be influenced by his example. 

REPRESENTATIVE OSCAR L. JACKSON [REP.], OF PENNSYLVANIA, SAID : 

Mr. Speaker: . . . we do not, perhaps, fully realize that we have ourselves been 
eye-witnesses and, in part, humble participants of the most important part of our country's 
history. For no matter how grand or glorious a future lies before us, to the generations yet 
to come, the history of our country for the past thirty years must for all time be the most 
interesting and important to the student and patriot. During all this time the record of the 
life and services of John A. Logan is so blended with the history of our country that they are 
inseparable. 

It is not that in any quality of mind or capacity for service he excelled each and everyone 
of his associates, but it is because in every position he has occupied, from the lowest to the 
highest, he has acquitted himself as one of the best representative citizens of his age. Since 
the death of Grant, the great chieftain whose soul went up to God from Mount McGregor, 
no citizen of the United States was so well known as Logan. His name was in very truth a 
household word throughout the land. His every act was open to inspection and criticism. 
How honestly, how wisely, how modestly he has borne himself in every condition and under 
every circumstance let history answer ; yea, more, let those who were from time to time his 
opponents be his judges and his reputation is safe. 

It was my fortune to serve for four years as a soldier in the Army of the Tennessee, 
of which General Logan was from the first a prominent leader, and at last its commander. 
Long before he became its commander he was as well known to the Army of the 
Tennessee as either Grant, Sherman, or McPherson. I do not mean to say he was superior 
to either of them. But he was a real soldier, a man of immense force and power. He had 
the confidence of the army, and I can recall more than one occasion when his presence on the 
field under fire was, in my judgment, worth "more than a thousand men." . . 

Logan was honored in his death by municipal and civil organizations, by army societies, 
and Grand Army Posts as few men have ever been. From all over this broad land came 
resolutions of sincere condolence to the afflicted family. 

Each year hereafter on Memorial Day, in every cemetery, church-yard, and God's-acre 
throughout our country, where a soldier's grave is made green, there will be a wreath for him. 
In every neighborhood where they meet to " bedeck the soldiers' graves with flowers and be- 
dew them with tears," when they give a double portion to the little mound that represents 
those who sleep in unknown graves, someone "most loving of them all" will strew the 
flowers in memory of the man who instituted this beautiful ceremony. . . . 



5 So 



LIFE OF LOGAN. 



REPRESENTATIVE CHARLES M. ANDERSON [DEM.], OF OHIO, SAID : 

Mr. Speaker : . . . John A. Logan imbibed from the wide-stretching prairies sur- 
rounding his humble home broad views and the true idea of freedom. He was a man pos- 
sessed of profound convictions and of unbending will if he believed he was in the right. 
All his personal and intellectual qualities were positive. 

In debate he was direct, intense, fearless. Bold in the assertion of his convictions, im- 
petuous in their vindication, he scorned evasion and despised hypocrisy. 

In the performance of duty he took no account of results and feared no consequences. 
He was familiar with all the weapons of debate, and he at times wielded the gentle power 
of persuasion, the convincing force of logic, and the strong blows of ridicule, often sweep- 
ing before him in a tempestuous outburst of eloquence all opposition to the high resolves 
and earnest convictions of his mighty soul. 

If he lost anything by neglected education his great genius supplied the defect. He 
always had his armor on, and Logan, either in the forum or on the battle-field, was ever 
ready for the rencounter. 

He was the advocate of liberty, and the devoted friend of the human race. He loved 
his friends with unswerving fidelity and never deserted them. He was a friend of I nth, 
and hated treason whether against his country or his friend. 

He sought to preserve the Union and maintain the Constitution ; he was the advocate 
of the universal freedom of man. He labored to restore peace and amity between the 
sections of our country, and performed his full share in healing the animosities engendered 
by the war. He sought to cherish industry and protect labor. He encouraged the settle- 
ment of our vast domain and the development of our resources. He came from the 
humbler class and his sympathies were always with the poor and the sons of toil. He was 
from them and one of them. 

Along the highway over which our country and people have journeyed during the past 
quarter of a century John A. Logan may be seen and traced. If he was your antagonist, 
he was an open one, scorning to attack by stealth or fight from ambush. He struck his 
blows in front and in daylight. Ready to forgive and forget a slight or insult done him, he 
was as eager to repair an injury done another. 

Wherever he was found he was stolid, sincere, intense, firm, honest, and courageous. 
If lie was a brilliant figure in the political arena, he was none the less so in the ^military. 
It mattered little to Logan whether on the field of battle, or in the halls of Congress; 
whether conducting his troops at the assault of Donelson, or maintaining a debate in the 
Senate of the United States ; whether managing a great Presidential campaign, or leading 
his army through Georgia ; whether caressing his loved ones at home, or enduring the 
privations of army life ; whether trudging along the ranks as a private soldier, or riding his 
charger at the head of his army. 

When our civil war burst like a terrible tempest upon the nation Logan buckled on his 
sword, rushed to battle and never halted until slavery was dead, freedom reigned trium- 
phant, and the union of all the States secured. As resistless against the foe as an avalanche 
rushing headlong from Alpine heights to desolate the plains below he combined the des- 
peration of Charles XII. with the generosity of a Cffisar. ... 

In peace he had no fortune but his genius, courage, and faith ; in war, no friend but Lis 
valor and sword ; yet we see him measuring arms with men of experience, rank, and power, 
and writing his name high on the escutcheon of fame, leaving the world better for having 
lived in it. 

He is dead ; dead to his State, but he lives to the nation ; dead to the family, but he 
lives to every lover of freedom on the globe. 

This great man will not be forgotten. His name and deeds are enrolled in the history 
of his age and he lives in the affections of a patriotic people. He will be remembered 
while liberty has a shrine and freedom a votary. His name will be cherished until the 
clouds forget to replenish the springs, the fountains to gush, or the rills to sing. In ages 
hence his lofty deeds will "be acted o'er in the nations yet unborn and accents yet un- 
known." 

Mr. Speaker, from the tears which this day fall on the bier of Logan the patriot, war- 
rior, and statesman, there springs a rainbow spanning our heavens, giving hope and prom- 
ise of the immortality of the Republic. 

The eulogies being ended, the resolutions offered by Mr. Thomas were adopted unani- 
mously ; and, in accordance therewith, the House of Representatives adjourned. 






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